Sol Invictus
by danishvulkanhestan
Summary: A woman born without a soul, An Heir Apparent of a Galactic Empire, a wanted terrorist, an ex-pirate, a smuggler, a crazed engineer, a mysterious warrior woman and stoic business man. All of them brought together through happenstance, destiny or just plan rotten luck, for a single purpose; Bring a warning to the galaxy. Stop a galaxy wide war.
1. The Dread Pirate Raven

**A/N:** Thanks go out to Selene Sokal and his fic, By Steel and Starlight, which helped inspire this work. If you haven't read it go give a look. It is really good.

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**Chapter One:**_ The Dread Pirate Raven_

_On board Muninn. Wild Space_

To say that the Heir Apparent of the Protectorate of Atlas, Weiss Schnee; Lady-Marshal of the March of Mantle, Countess of the planet of Mantle and The Shield of Atlas, was in an uncomfortable position, was to make the grossest of understatements.

Her prison cell in the brig was dark and cramped. It barely had enough room for even her, as short as she was, to stretch out with even a modicum of comfort. The only light Weiss was afforded was when the door opened, where it would shine through, just ever so briefly, as her 'generous' hosts delivered to Weiss her daily bread and water. This was usually some sort of recyke nutrient paste formed into a stiff brick bar and water tinged with the taste of copper from the treatment filters on board. This was also the only human contact she was afforded.

Not that she particularly cared for her guard.

The guard her captors had chosen, or maybe who had volunteered; Weiss wasn't exactly sure, was a spiteful and arrogant woman. Her hair was shaved close to her head, tattoos and kill-markings ran up her bare arms. Some of which, Weiss noted dejectedly, were fresh and still raw. No doubt to mark out some of her unfortunate crew.

"Awww what's the matter, Captain?" The woman smirked, faux concern dripping from her mouth like poison. "Your quarters not to your liking? I assure you it is the best that we can offer you, Milady."

Weiss said nothing, she wouldn't give a pirate wretch like this the satisfaction.

"Not talkin' eh? Ah well." The smirk, if it was possible, grew wider as she held out a tin plate. "Brought you breakfast… nice steaming pile of recyke…"

The plate fell from her fingers, crashing to the floor with a wet splat and clang of tin on armoured plating.

"Damn. Sorry about that, just clumsy I guess," she clucked her tongue, "Well… that's all you get until dinner."

Weiss shrugged and turned away, pulling her tattered officer's coat around her like a blanket.

The woman outside her cage snorted. "You know… you could end this. All you have to do is tell us who you are. Which House you belong to, Atlassian. You're worth a few creds. Might as well tell us…"

Weiss knew better than that. If she did, her crew was dead. These pirates needed them alive for the time being. If only just to question them. Once they found out that Weiss was Heir Apparent of the Protectorate, the crew would lose all value and just be a waste of resources. Better off dead then consuming valuable calories and drinking water.

She leaned in closer, face obscured by shadows, the light behind her giving her a faint artificial glow. Her tone changed from mocking, to cruel and cold. "Then we could stop asking your crew. They've been really unhelpful as well, and let's face it, your nobleness… they aren't worth it. So what do we care if one, or two, or a dozen decided to go for a cold walk?"

Weiss leapt at her, crashing against the bars straining to wrap her fingers around the other woman's throat.

The guard barely reacted, a thin cruel smile spreading on her lips.

"Touched a nerve I see. Well… like I said, just tell us who you are. Do that and I will personally see that no more of your crew decide to eat vac."

"I'm going to kill you," Weiss hissed, her voice as frozen as the vast ice fields of Atlas.

The woman grinned as she stood up and turned on her heel, leaving Weiss once again in the solitude and darkness of her small prison cage.

Leaving her to her despair, anger, hatred and the constant repeat of the attack replaying in her mind's eye.

The attack had been unfathomably swift and terrifying in its brutal execution.

It was Weiss's first command, fresh from the private tutors, career officers and other nobles hired to instruct her and mold her into the picture of a perfect Atlassian. To celebrate, she had been given command of the frigate _Tundra March_ and a patrol to the frontier of Atlas space.

In reality, her command, her tour, was little more than propaganda. A display to the common people that the House of Schnee was the ruling House. It was a display of family duty to other Houses of the Noble Officer class, that Jaques Schnee was still Lord-Protector of the Protectorate of Atlas and his family would share in that duty.

The patrol was slated to take three months and cover the most stable and uninteresting part of the Protectorate of Atlas's Frontier. It was to be done in the utmost secrecy. Only her Executive Officer had been informed of who she actually was, with the rest of the crew not told anything of who their Commanding Officer was, until well after _Tundra March_'s departure from port. Even then it was just rumors amongst the common voidsmen.

Not that the secrecy had ultimately mattered much.

Two weeks into the dull, uninteresting patrol, in an uninteresting dead system, a system which only warranted a name simply because it existed, _Tundra March_ struck a mine.

The mine had detonated near the aft of the ship; just before the engine room. The explosion tore a massive hole in _Tundra March,_ knocking her off keel and sending her adrift. Her power fluctuating, two of her engines dead, venting atmosphere and crew into the silent void.

Weiss had only just climbed back to her feet, when, over the cries of the wounded, the calls of damage control and the cacophony of alarms, the sensorius called out two more contacts; both of which had only just been picked up on the barely functioning sensors.

Assault boats filled with boarders - 'ticks' as voidsmen called them.

Weiss had rushed over to the sensor station and saw they had maybe a minute or two at the most before the ticks would latch onto _Tundra March_. They would cut and peel their way through her armour. Then the boarders would flood into Weiss's ship.

Weiss was already reacting; giving orders to the Atlas Marines to entrench themselves, and prepare to repel the attackers. Her crew were disorganized, fighting a dozen fires which had spread through the decks, while yet more tried to seal off the areas ripped open to the void.

None of that truly mattered.

They were Atlassians.

They were the definition of discipline. The epitome of calm on the line.

They would meet these boarders and they would throw them back into space.

Back out into the cold void.

At least that had been the plan.

Unfortunately, Weiss's plan died stillborn when _Tundra March _shook as several high-velocity, solid slug railgun rounds, from what could only be another ship's main battery slammed into her. Damage was extensive, fires broke out as armour buckled and several more systems failed. Over the ship-wide comms, Weiss could hear the screams and gunfire as the boarders pushed their way in. No doubt heading to the main power core, or engine room. Or the bridge. The _Tundra March_ shook violently from another round of railgun fire.

If it wasn't for the boarders cutting their way into her ship, Weiss would have been forgiven for thinking that these were shots intended to kill, and not cripple further.

They were done.

They were beaten.

Even if boarders were repelled, _Tundra March _was utterly crippled. She was a sitting wreck, easy prey for the ship that was now racking them with railgun fire.

To resist was to die.

There would be no honour in dying and achieving nothing.

Weiss did something she never thought she could do. Never thought she would do.

She asked for terms… and surrendered her ship to the Captain of the black ship _Muninn-_ the Dread Pirate Raven; the Scourge of Mistral, the Pirate-Queen of Wild Space, the most infamous pirate to plague the more civilised areas of space, since the Great War

Soon afterwards she was brought on board, separated from her crew and thrown into this cell.

Weiss reached out a hand through her bars, fingers stretched and fumbling at the canteen of water just in reach. She needed to think, she needed to plan.

She would get out of this. Somehow.

Weiss took a deep breath. She was Atlassian. She was a Schnee. It was expected, demanded of her. She had to live up to her family name.

And by the Gods of the Void, Weiss promised herself, she would be so much more than her family name.

Yang winced as she heard the wet, bruising sound of a fist hammering into a gut. The coughing, weak sputter of a man unable to defend himself, as two pairs of burly arms held him up. Tears of pain ran down the man's face as he slumped in his captors' arms; His once pristine white uniform now solid in sweat, mucus and blood.

"Two punches… jus' two is all it takes te make ye more limp than me grandmum?" the interrogator asked in disgust. He turned and looked over to where Raven Branwen stood tall but disinterested in the casual brutality.

Why Raven had asked - in reality had demanded- that Yang come down to witness this was beyond her.

Yang felt her fist tighten in the heavily-padded gloves she always wore now; feeling the scales on her rigid knuckles stretching the fabric and rubbing against the built-in heavy shock-plates. The interrogator had gone back to his work, striking at the man's face, before switching his aim to the kidneys.

"This one ain't worth the effort Cap'in. Might as well send 'im off fer a little walk outside." The man sneered as he turned back towards them.

Raven said nothing and continued to watch. Every now and then, her blood red eyes would slide over to Yang, studying her, gauging her reaction; judging her as Raven always had.

The interrogator shrugged and pulled the man up by his hair. "So… I'm goin te ask' ye again lad… who is ye Cap'in? What 'owse is she from? Jus' up an tell an I'll stop 'ittin' ye. Trust me boy, I can be doin' this all day and night."

The man said nothing, other than groan and mutter small incoherent insults.

Yang had to admit, she admired the boy's courage.

"Is there a point to this, Raven?" Yang finally asked, growing tired of the display. Her tongue running of the tips of her fangs.

"There is," her mother replied, not even bothering to turn and look at her daughter.

Silence once again fell between the two women. The beatings continued unabated at a steady pace. The rhythmic thump of punches wore Yang's already thin patience down more and more.

"What? Other than to show that you get off on punching helpless prisoners?" Yang finally spat back. "If that's all then I'm heading back to my quarters."

"You will do no such thing, Yang. You will stay right there." Raven ordered, finally moving to turn and glare at her, "You need to see this. You need to be a part of this."

Yang glared back, a silent test of wills between the two women. Finally, Yang huffed and leaned back against the wall. Yang knew Raven, she knew there was something coming, something that she knew she wasn't going to be able to avoid.

Better to face it head first, instead of pussy-footing around it. That wasn't her style anyway.

Raven continued to glare at her daughter, which Yang dutifully ignored, before allowing a self-satisfied smile stretch across her lips.

"Vernal," Raven spoke into the communication device woven into her collar. "Bring our esteemed guest to the interrogation chamber. I'm growing tired of these games and believe a demonstration has become more than necessary."

"Right away Raven. We'll be right up," came the crackling reply over the com.

Yang barely resisted the urge to roll her eyes. Vernal was a sycophant and Raven's little attack-dog.

_Gods… She sounds like an arrogant bitch even over the com._

They didn't have long to wait, the door opened and the white-clad officer was aggressively pushed through and into the small room, Vernal following behind with a confident swagger and that familiar arrogant smirk.

Yang only had the briefest glimpse of the Atlassian officer; she hadn't been allowed to be part of the boarding party and had been forced to watch the attack on the frigate from the bridge.

The officer was surprisingly young for someone to be placed in command, her long white hair disheveled, her officer's uniform rumpled and torn in several places. A long scar over her left eye was the only mar on her which Yang could see. It didn't take away from her beauty, it added to it. It gave her a ruggedness, made her seem more human than the image of a porcelain doll that her pale flesh and ice blue eyes gave.

"Well then, so are you still refusing to cooperate with us?" Raven asked as the Atlassian recovered from the push, standing straight and tall despite the restraints around her arms. She glared right into Raven's amused, red eyes, not bothering to respond.

"I will admit, your defiance, while at first amusing, has tried my patience. So I will ask you one last time, Atlassian. Who are you? What is your House?"

The officer said nothing, but continued to stare down the three pirate women, breaking eye contact only to take the briefest glance at her subordinate, who was hanging in the arms of his captors, crying and panting in pain.

Seconds passed as the Officer refused to answer, or break further eye contact; she was daring them to do their worst.

Finally, it was Raven who broke the fragile silence, an almost gentle pulling at her thin lips.

"I admire resilience. Especially in one so young"

Yang couldn't believe the almost serene gentle smile that crossed over Raven's lips. In the two years since she had known her mother, she had never seen Raven give someone a look that bordered on mercy or even kindness.

It put her on edge. Yang knew something wholly unpleasant was being dreamt up in Raven's mind.

There was only one rule with Raven. The strong live, the strong take, the weak die.

"Well," Raven continued, "let's see how long that resolve can last. Yang. Kill him."

The officer let out an involuntary gasp. The captive stiffened, then sagged almost acceptingly into his guards' arms.

"What?" Yang asked turning to her mother with a look of confusion and horror.

"I said kill him." Raven gestured to the man, more of a boy really. "This Noble refuses to cooperate with us. Though I do admire her resolve, it does not come without consequence. Kill him."

Yang stood there silent. Her hands tightened into fists, shaking with rage. She felt the scales on her forehead crease as her temper began to slip from her control.

It was a state of being familiar to Yang, one that flooded her system with adrenaline, one that made her faster, stronger and hit harder than any normal human. Even without her gene-tailoring.

But now… now she needed to be calm. She needed a clear head. She was walking a tightrope, Raven was testing her.

"No." She finally spat, getting her anger under control. "I won't do it."

Raven's grin slowly vanished, her eyes became cold as she regarded her daughter. "No?"

"No." Yang spat again, matching her mother's ruthless stare.

"So you are going to challenge me? Is that it? Take _Muninn_ for your own? Are you strong enough to even dare?" Raven hissed as she drew the short blade at her hip. "Well Yang, are you?"

For the first time in her life, Yang felt herself hesitate. Her mother had pointed her sword at her, challenging her. Raven was daring her to make a move.

Yang could feel her temper spike again.

Vernal's smirk widened. It was clear she had already envisioned the outcome, and was now simply enjoying the show, as she eagerly awaited the prospect of violence.

The Atlassian was quiet, eyes darting between the three other women and the men holding her crewmate.

_What was she planning?_ Yang quickly suppressed the thought. It didn't matter and being distracted, being hesitant would give Raven every opening she would need.

Yang could feel her hand inching towards the holster of _Ember Celica _at her hip. Her fingers flexed almost eagerly, itching to grip it, itching to draw.

"Remember this, Yang." Raven's voice was cold, frigid, but also tinged with the same excitement flooding through Yang right at that very moment. The excitement of the prospect of a battle for supremacy between the two women. "If you draw, and when you lose, you will lose everything. Not just your life, but your sister's will be forfeit as well."

Yang's hand froze above her pistol's grip. Ice-cold fear quenched the white-hot rage in an instant.

"She has nothing to do with this," Yang hissed, choking down the panic at the thought of her little sister Ruby being hurt.

"Of course she does." Raven smiled grimly; "If she lives, she'll try and take revenge. So what is your choice? Draw and lose everything? Or do as I say? His life, or your's and your sister's?"

Yang hesitated, her own life she was more than willing to risk. It was part of who she was, a thrill seeker, an adventurer. But she wouldn't, she couldn't risk Ruby's. Not after they had just been reunited. Not after they were slowly coming together again.

Yang's hand fell limp and she took in a deep shuddering breath. "Fine. I'll do it."

Yang turned and walked towards the helpless man, watching as he struggled, as bruised and beaten as he was, to hold himself up. To look her in the eye.

Yang barely felt her hand move as she slowly pulled the heavy boarding-pistol from its well-oiled holster. She could feel the heavy weight of the ceramic and steel, as it came free. Slowly she raised and pointed the pistol at the boy's head.

The two stared at each other for several seconds: the condemned and the executioner.

Yang squeezed the trigger. The pistol bucked in her hand as it roared.

The boy's head exploded, splattering apart in a mess of blood, skull fragments, and grey matte,painting the back wall in ghastly portrait.

The pirates let the corpse fall to the floor and laughed as they did. Blood from the headless body pooled quickly and slicked the floor.

Their job was done.

"Well, that's that." Vernal snickered, "Good to see you actually do have some brains in your head, Yang."

Yang turned, wanting to strike at the arrogant woman, but stopped herself.

Now wasn't the time. Not with Raven standing there.

"Vernal, you are no longer our guest's guard, Yang, you will take her place. Now see that Weiss Schnee is seen back to her quarters, we have important guest arriving in the next several cycles, I want to be ready for them."

"Weiss Schnee? The heir to the Protectorate?" Yang whispered.

The officer looked stunned as well.

"You...You know who I am?" The officer, Schnee asked, her already pale face turned even paler if such a thing was at all possible.

"I knew who you were the moment we attacked your ship." Raven replied, "You really think I would risk attacking an Atlassian frigate for some no-name noble?"

"Then what was that about?" Yang asked, barely containing her rage and loathing. Gesturing at the corpse. "Why did I have to kill him, if you already knew?"

Raven regarded her daughter with little more than contempt. " You needed this. A point had to be made. You are soft. Weak. You could have refused. You could have tried to kill me, maybe even succeeded. But you are so attached to that thing that you call a sister that I could use her against you. Now see to the Schnee, that's an order."

With that, Raven pushed past them, Vernal following behind, only pausing briefly to send the two of them that arrogant, sickening smile she was so well known for, before following after her captain like the loyal dog she was.

Leaving Yang alone with the Heir apparent, Weiss Schnee.

Leaving Weiss alone with someone who had just murdered one of her crew.


	2. The White Fang

**A/N:** Thanks go out to Selene Sokal and his fic, By Steel and Starlight, which helped inspire this work. If you haven't read it go give a look. It is really good. This fic is not a prequel to his, its only inspired by.

**You may also be wondering about Blake's name; I wanted the Faunus to feel like they have their own culture, naming conventions and actually feel like a separate distinct people. Their naming convention is their Family Name first, followed by clan then given name. The 'Ist' in their name is their way of saying 'I am from' or 'Of this place.' Much like the German 'Von.'**

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**Chapter Two:**_ The White Fang_

Ruby Rose loved ships, she loved everything about them and every type. From three-man fighters and interceptors to the behemoth dreadnaughts and carriers. Ruby was never happier than when she was exploring, learning or working on a spacecraft. It was exactly because of this love of ships she wished that she was allowed to explore every inch of the _Muninn_ more often.

Sadly, permission was a rare event and it was always begrudgingly given by Aunt Raven.

Though it also wasn't often that Ruby did ask for permission. Nor did she ever approach her pirate aunt without Yang's, her older sister, supporting presence.

So Ruby had developed a love/hate relationship with the _Muninn. _

She loved the ship for what it was. From the RSDC Series 2 power core, to her sleek Adel-Rolls R Series 450 sub-light engines, to the polished gleam of her black bulkheads, to the incredibly rare and expensive Luna-Shawcross DF2 Fold drive. The _Muninn_ was an engineering marvel.

She hated the ship for what it was. A frigate-sized, but cramped ship, filled with people who went out of their way to avoid her; with Ruby's only real friend being her older sister. Not even Aunt Raven cared to spend any time getting to know her ex-husband's second daughter.

Ruby was used to the disparaging glares and sneers that she got from Raven and her crew. It wasn't all that different from the Royal Valian Naval Academy; were even the instructors did not particularly care to be in close proximity of the energetic burnette for long periods of time.

No, she avoided Raven more for the sense of potential violence which seemed to coalesce around Raven like a thick miasma.

"Sorry, Rubes." Yang would say, as the two sisters would walk back to their shared quarters. "Raven is… Well, she's busy. Lots for us to do. Maybe next time."

Ruby never asked Yang why she always referred to her mother as Raven. She wanted to. Desperately too. But it had been years since Yang had run away to join Raven in Wild Space; and the two of them had only recently reunited.

Though the two young women had made great strides in reconciliation; to the point were sometimes it almost felt like they were back home on Port Patch, or on their father's old freighter; they were still… hesitant over certain subjects.

Raven being one of those.

Yang's gene-tailoring being another.

Ruby sighed. She had been frightened when she had first finally reunited with her older sister planetside; before being brought onboard _Muninn_. If it hadn't been for the long, blonde hair and lilac coloured eyes, Ruby would have hardly recognized the hulking, almost brutish stranger who waited for her at the dock that day.

Yang had always been big, tough, strong. Now she looked like she could rival those who had grown up on high grav worlds. Her arms, legs, shoulders were thick with muscle and bone. The scaly ridges on Yang's forehead, the slit pupil eyes and elongated, animalistic, fang-like canines, frightened her. If Ruby hadn't known any better she would have sworn her sister was a Faunus. The sight had caused Ruby to doubt that Yang was really Yang anymore.

But then as soon as Ruby stepped off the shuttle, Yang had run over and scooped her up in a tight, loving hug; and Ruby felt her doubts and fears melt away. Yang almost broke her younger sister's ribs, as she embraced her for the first time in years. The two of them nearly crying in each other's arms.

The look of pure joy and happiness that had split Yang's mouth into a wide smile. It was so obvious that Yang regretted splitting the two sisters up. Regretted leaving Ruby behind as she wandered off to explore the galaxy and find her mother. Ruby cried herself; for doubting her big sister. So here they were. Comfortable with each other for the most part, but still having to walk delicately around one another.

_Speaking of Yang, _Ruby groaned irritably inward. _Where is she? I'm booooooored!_

She had been gone for several hours. At least according to the crono-sphere in their cabin. She had gone to take care of some business for Aunt Raven and had left Ruby with precious little to do in the meantime.

_Well… I could always clean Crescent Rose… Again… _Ruby spared a sideways glance at her precious rifle. It was one of the very few things that Ruby had brought with her from the Academy. _Crescent Rose_ was her baby. Her prized possession. A VA M29 designated marksman rifle; Ruby had been quick to tamper with, rebuild and customise every part from the upper to lower reciever, pistol grip, trigger assembly, fire selection and even the barrel. She had even given the rifle a red and black custom paint job, with a stylized rose right above the magazine well.

Currently, her beloved weapon was laid out on Ruby and Yang's shared table. Ruby had stripped her down, laying each part out in a neat, meticulous order. From there Ruby had obsessively gone over each and every part until they shone brightly even in the dim light of _Muninn_.

To clean _Crescent Rose_ again would be the height of that Ruby wasn't willing to do it. Nothing was too good for her baby.

Or… She could go out to find Yang. Maybe catch Aunt Raven in a good mood. A good enough mood that she would allow Ruby to wander through the belly of the _Muninn_?

It was tempting.

So that was her choice. Sit around, clean _Crescent Rose_ for the seventh hundredth time. Or go and ask her Aunt.

_Besides Yang is there talking to her. It couldn't hurt to ask. _An eager, but nervous smile playing across her lips as she slipped on her bright red cloak and stepped out into the dim hall.

* * *

The snapping of metal, the of breaking porcelain and the shattering of glass echoed in Raven's quarters, as Yang's fist smashed through the incredibly expensive Mistral tea set and the crystal and gold inlay table it had once sat upon.

Raven huffed irritability as Yang, it seemed was unsatisfied with merely breaking what had once been an extravagant tea set; decorated with painstakingly hand painted scenes of cherry trees in full bloom, their blossoms catching on the warm spring winds; and its equally masterworked table; and so continued to punch it until it was an unrecognizable mess of porcelain, crystal and broken shards of twisted metal.

"Are you quite finished with your tantrum? Or do you wish to find something else worth more than a Mistralian frigate to smash?" Raven asked when Yang, panting heavily in deep, shuddering breaths finally stopped.

Behind Yang stood the ever-faithful Vernal, her tattooed and kill-marked arms crossed above her chest; she bore a look of rare concern. Not that it was needed, but Raven still valued the loyalty.

"Tantrum?" Yang bit back, " you made me kill a man in cold blood! Then tell me I am throwing a tantrum?"

"Because you are." Raven never once raised her voice, but allowed a tinge of ice-cold anger to colour it. "I gave you a choice. You choose to follow through with it. Now you get to live with it."

"That bullshit again? You never gave me a choice. It was that or die." Yang glared at her as she shook her head, "Dad never wanted me to come out here. Uncle Qrow told me to stay away from you. I couldn't. I had to see who you are with my own eyes. Away from Dad's nostalgia and Uncle Qrow's cynicism."

"And have I lived up to your expectations? Your dreams, your fantasies?" Raven rolled her eyes, a hint of an ill patient frown forming. "This is who were are. We are the strong, so we take. I am the strongest, so I lead. That is all there is to it. If you thought that a pirate would be fun, adventure, steal from the rich for the needy then you are even more foolish than I ever thought. Your father's influence no doubt."

"You don't get to talk about him like that!" Yang whirled on her, hands clenched into fists. "He was there. He raised me, never abandoned me to go off and play pirate-queen in some far off flung shit-hole in the galaxy."

"Yet here you are." Raven smirked, "so eager for praise and so willing to do what I ask. You cannot blame me for the choices you make my daughter."

Yang fell silent for a moment, staring at the remains of the tea set and crystal table. There was truth to that. She had done what Raven asked. She had been apart of boarding parties, seizing ships and killing the crew. But they had always been armed. They always had a way of fighting back.

_But was it any different?_

Yang felt sick to her stomach just asking herself the question. Raven was right. It had been Yang's choice. No matter what excuse she tried to come up with.

Yang took a long calming breath, lilac coloured eyes met Raven's blood red. "I'm leaving Raven. I'm taking Ruby and I am leaving. I'm done with this, I'm done with you. We're going back home."

"Are you now?" Raven asked with a hint of amusement.

"Yes. You can't stop me Raven." Yang hissed, turning to leave. "Get out of my way Vernal."

"I don't need to do anything to stop you from leaving Yang. You've oh so helpfully put that collar around your own neck."

Yang snorted as she reached for the door control.

"What would Ruby think of her big sister painting the back wall with brains of an unarmed and helpless man?" Raven said, arching a delicate black eyebrow.

Yang frose. Her hand just over the control. If Ruby found out… it would destroy them. She was still haunted by Ruby's fearful silver eyes when they had met at the docks. Ruby had been frightened, terrified by what her big sister had become. If Ruby found out she was a murderer, what little connection they had rebuilt would be gone.

Yang would be alone. Truly alone. Just the thought of that sent chills down her spine.

"You wouldn't." Yang's voice barely registered above a whisper.

"I would. You have a weakness, one that I can and will exploit. You are useful to this tribe and to this crew Yang. I don't like to waste useful things." Raven's tone was bored and uninterested, as though discussing the weather. "Now, go see to the prisoner and get prepared for our guest. They should be arriving in the next three days or so. I want us to be prepared. You are dismissed, Yang."

Before Yang could turn to leave, there was a hesitant knock on the door.

"Cap'in Raven." The man at the door nodded in respect as he entered,. "Forgive the interruption but we received a message from the buyer."

"And you couldn't call me on the com?" Raven asked, clearly annoyed. It was never particularly healthy to the life expectancy of the one she was annoyed at.

"It was marked specifically for you Cap'in. I wouldn't have interrupted if it wasn't." The man held out a small disk, his hand shaking with nerves.

Raven rolled her eyes. "Fine. Yang bring it here, and you, get out of my sight."

She took the disk from Yang, slotting it into the player. Soon a holographic woman appeared in the middle of the player. Long black hair, eyes hidden by a white mask of Grimm… and a pair of twitching cat ears on the top of her head.

"Faunus." Yang gasped in surprise. This was unexpected. It was rare to see the Faunus outside of the Menagerie Systems.

"Captain Branwen Raven Ist _Muninn_." The recording started with a nod of her head, "I am Belladonna Zech Blake Ist White Fang. I have been asked by our leader Brother-Commander Taurus Naut Adam Ist White Fang to open negotiations and confirm that the prisoner is indeed who you say she is. My ship and I will be arriving at the coordinates you gave him within the standard day. I look forward to speaking with such an ally."

The hologram gave another nod of her head, before flickering away.

It was all Yang could do to retain her horror, keeping her head straight and expression unreadable. _The White Fang? She's planning on selling the Schnee to the White Fang?_

The White Fang were extremists, who thought the Faunus Uprising was still a war being fought. They were enemies of the Protectorate; while Yang was no fan of Atlas she knew what the White Fang would do if they got their hands on the Heir Apparent.

Across from her, Raven met her eyes and smiled that cold, calculating smile of hers.

It would be war.

* * *

Ruby ran. She needed to get back to their room. She needed time, time to think, time to process. It couldn't be true. It couldn't.

She felt tears running down her cheek.

No. No.

It wasn't possible. Yang was emotional, sure. She had a temper that was more than obvious. But she wasn't a murderer. She couldn't be.

_The old Yang could have never had murdered someone._ Another more cynical part of Ruby's mind whispered, _but what about this new one? The one who I haven't seen in five years. _

Images of Yang staying up late reading her bedtime stories, bandaging skinned knees and packing her lunches for school, danced through her head. It was quashed brutally an instant later by a new hulking and unnatural monster. A monster wearing her sister's face, whose lips were now curled into a slasher's crazed grin.

The door to their room slid open, as Ruby dashed inside, jumping onto her cot, taking in deep, calming breaths.

_Okay, okay. Breathe calm down. Did I hear what I thought I heard? _Ruby closed her eyes, hearing Raven's voice float through where Ruby had been listening at the door of Raven's cabin.

"_What would Ruby think of her big sister painting the back wall with brains of an unarmed and helpless man?"_

And all Yang could respond with was a helpless whisper of "_you wouldn't."_

Ruby's face fell. She had done it. Yang had murdered someone.

And it broke Ruby's heart.

Yang had changed. The years had changed her. Every doubt, every fear that Ruby had felt when she saw what Yang had become. The mon…

Ruby's eyes settled on the picture, hanging just above Yang's bed. A crayon drawing. Simple, yellowing with age. A four-year-old's picture; the vivid colours, too bright and gaudy to exist in reality, the simple lines and unproportioned autonomy of the two children and the mother and father, all of whom were far too big to fit in the small box simply labeled 'house.' Misspelled of course.

Yang had kept it all these years. Above her bed.

Yang wasn't a monster.

They would have a lot to talk about. Yang had left her, left her to go and wander the galaxy looking for Raven, looking for her mother. Despite what their dad had told them, despite what Uncle Qrow had warned them, Yang was so stubborn and so hot-headed she went anyway.

Yang had killed people. She had changed. Or had been changed.

But despite everything, Yang still kept that picture, taped over her bed.

Ruby knew they would have a lot to say. She knew there would be anger, she knew there would be yelling. Not just from Yang, but from herself as well. But they could deal with that later.

Yang needed her. Yang would never admit it, but she needed someone to rescue her. She was trapped on this pirate ship.

Ruby smiled as old memories of Yang walking her to school, making breakfast, scolding their comatose father after Summer had passed away. Teaching him how to be a father again once Qrow had snapped him out of his dressed stupor.

Now it was Ruby's turn to protect her sister. All she needed was a plan.

Ruby stood up and walked over to where _Crescent Rose _lay stripped on the table, she closed her eyes and began reassembling the rifle.

It was a short time later that Yang burst into the room just as Ruby finished tightening _Crescent Rose_'s scope onto the top of the rail.

She barely got a word out in greeting, before Yang had picked her up and pulled her into a bone-cracking sisterly hug.

"Yang… can't breathe." Ruby managed to squeak before Yang gently put her down.

"Ruby… I'm sorry. I messed up. I've messed up." Yang blurted, as she rushed past her sister, grabbing a bag and shoving her belongings haphazardly into it.

"Get your stuff ready to go." Yang ordered firmly, "we're leaving."

"Leaving?" Ruby asked, brow furrowed in confusion. She hadn't been expecting this. Ruby had thought it would be a massive fight to try and convince her sister to leave.

Yang nodded, grabbing the crayon drawing and carefully folding it, before placing it gently in a breast pocket.

"Leaving. You and me…" Yang hesitated, "... and the prisoner Raven has onboard."

Ruby nodded in relief. "Good."

She looked over at her completed rifle on the desk, her silver eyes then sliding to the pistol on Yang's hip. "You got a plan?"

Yang smiled nervously. "No… You know me… I've never been one to sit around and think things through. But were going to need one soon The White Fang are coming to meet us in less than a day."

"The White Fang?" Ruby couldn't believe what she was hearing, her sister was dealing with the White Fang of all people?

"Yes the White Fang. Which is why we need to get out of here as soon as we can." Yang collapsed down on her cot, "some guarantor arriving first before the actual buyer. So we need to get out of here before the buyer actually arrives."

"Alright then," Ruby pulled her chair close to her sister cot and sat down facing Yang. "So the guarantor is arriving before the actual buyer?"

Yang nodded. "No idea how long before hand. Maybe a day at the most."

Ruby sat there quiet for several minutes, then she smiled, the beginnings of a plan forming in her mind. "Okay then. I have an idea…"

* * *

Weiss's eyes snapped open as the door to the brig slid open with a hiss. Dull artificial light from the lamps just outside the brig flooded her dark, cramped cell.. There was the smell of recyke and the heavy tread of boots belonging to that hulking genebred freak.

"I...brought you dinner."

The plate was placed gently on the floor, just in front of her cage. Weiss turned to look at her new guard. Yang, she thought she recalled; or something similar.

The woman's head was bowed, refusing to look Weiss in the eye, even as she placed a small canteen of water next to the tray.

"It's… mostly recyke, unfortunately. But I was able to grab a lump of ship bread too." The woman, Yang, sounded almost apologetic; as she waved a hand at the lump of grey matter next to the bar of recyke.

"So what?" Weiss finally spat, her voice rough from a lack of use over the past weeks. "Want me to thank you? Want me to bestow my gratitude onto a murderer?"

She sat up onto her knees, all the room that her cage barely allowed; before bowing at the waist to Yang.

"Thank you oh my dear captor. Thank you for showing me some small mercy, after you shot my unarmed crewmember. I will remember this magnanimous show of grace from a murderer when I am finally released to whatever slave market, or small-time warlord, your oh so merciful Mistress deems fit for her purpose. Truly you have earned the favour of the Heir-Apparent of the Protectorate."

Weiss couldn't help but grin as Yang's eyes narrowed and her temper flared briefly at the sarcasm which dripped from the Heir-Apparent. Apparently struggling not to lash out and quash it as Yang's body shook with anger.

"I didn't really have a choice." Yang snarled, before taking another calming breath. "I'm not here for that anyway."

"Oh? Then why? Here to gloat? Here to see the fall of grace of your better?" Weiss's tone was as sharp as the Atlassian tundra wind in the deep of winter. "I didn't give that woman before you the satisfaction. You can expect the same, brute."

"Raven wants to sell you to the White Fang." Yang cut in. Weiss noticed her fingers curling as though she was only a step away from wanting to strangle her. "They are going to be here in the next day or so."

That stopped Weiss cold. Any retort, or insult she had planned to throw at the gene-tailored blonde, was caught in her fear swollen throat.

"The White Fang?" Weiss finally whispered unbelievably. "Why… that…"

Weiss paused, collected herself. "If your Captain turns me over to the White Fang… I'll be executed."

Yang nodded. "I know."

"No, I don't think you do." Weiss snapped, before leaning back against the wall. "If the White Fang kills me, the Protectorate will have no choice but to go to war with Menagerie. It would be a slaughter..."

"Which would drag in the other powers." Yang finished for her. "Another Great War, billions dying, whole systems left to waste and to the mercy of pirates like Raven. Not to mention the Grimm."

Weiss looked up at her, somewhat in shock.

Yang shrugged with a barely concealed smug grin. "Just because I am some space pirate frontier bumpkin doesn't mean I don't have some grasp on the current state of the galaxy."

She took a quick look over the back of her shoulder before leaning in close to Weiss's cage, her voice hushed and quick. "Look, there is a small group of them coming to see if you are who we say you are. That's going to be our best chance. You, me and my sister, are going to take their ship and get out of here. This is going to be our only chance. I suggest you eat and regain some of your strength."

She pushed the tray closer to Weiss.

"I never wanted any of this. So I am going to do what is right."

Yang stood up and without another word walked out of the brig, leaving Weiss alone with the tray and the dark.

* * *

Belladonna Zech Blake Ist White Fang paced uneasily up and down the small bridge of the raider _Red Claw_. Adam had trusted her with this task. His top lieutenant, his favourite amongst all his White Fang Brothers and Sisters.

His best friend

His lover.

And the one who would betray him.

It wasn't going to be easy. It would be her and the captive against several dozen pirates. Then Bake would need to kill her compatriots. Faunus she had spent the better part of several years serving with. Fighting on the frontier against slavers, pirates and raiders and then themselves becoming those same pirates, slavers and raiders.

When she was a girl, the White Fang were her heroes. The ones who had united the divided clans and families. The ones who had driven the Protectorate out of Menagerie. They had rebuilt Faunus culture, preserved their history. The ones who later fought against the slavers, pirates and raiders who descended on the system, like vultures to prey.

It broke her heart to admit it, but the White Fang had changed.

Or maybe they hadn't.

Now she had seen what the White Fang truly was. This ship the _Red Claw _was part of that proof. It had been a human ship. A freighter making the runs from the Protectorate to the Vacuo Union, the White Fang had seized. The crew, at least those who weren't useful, were disposed of. The rest were forced to teach the various White Fang members what skills they knew. They were kept alive only because they were useful. To be later disposed of when that usefulness wore out.

Blake had only realized that recently.

Then Adam had shared his grand plan with her; the new ally he had made in Wild Space.

Blake shuddered._ No_.

The White Fang, once a beacon for hope, a brighter future for the Faunus, was now a force so blinded by their own righteousness; it had become self-destructive. Not just for itself, but for Faunus kind.

"Sister-Lieutenant Belladonna." A helmswoman wearing a heavy Ursa Grimm mask approached her, dragging Blake from her thoughts. "Preparations have been made, the Fold-Drive is online. We can make the Fold anytime on your orders."

Blake nodded. "Thank you Sister. Prepare to Fold on my mark."

She watched the tick of seconds on her the crono strapped to her wrist, counting allowed for the bridge crew to hear. "Four, three, Gods of Sanctuary Preserve. Mark."

In an instant, thousands of billions of kilometres condensed and folded in on themselves; _Red Claw_ shot forward, towards a meeting with the last person Blake ever thought she would have to rescue.

Blake would have to save Weiss Schnee, Heir-Apparent of the Protectorate of Atlas, from not the Dread-Pirate Raven, but her own Brothers and Sisters of the White Fang.

She had her work cut out for herself.


	3. Escape of the Muninn

**Chapter Three:** _Escape From the Muninn_

Blake didn't know what she expected when she saw the _Muninn_ from the viewing screen on the bridge of the shuttle as it traveled between the _Red Claw _and the _Muninn_. Maybe, she thought, the _Muninn_ would be like the Union ships, haphazardly built with garishly painted markings from whatever world she had came from.

Maybe the _Muninn _would be like the Atlassians: clean, hard lines; polished until they gleamed in the void, their overly pompous commanders' House sigils proudly displayed on their bows, next to the sigil of the Protectorate.

The _Muninn_, however, was none of those.

She hung there like a shadow in the void, a black specter. No lights other than the brief flash of landing guides. The hard projected lines of her railguns could only be seen in the flashes of passing starlight, which made the _Muninn_ all the more intimidating.

Knowing those guns were there, but only seeing them for small flashes in the darkness of the void.

And inside that sleek shadow were dozens of pirates. Standing between her and a single Atlassian officer, who Blake had to rescue.

_Well… just my luck. _Blake sighed, as she schooled her emotions, creating a mask of stoic indifference, even as worry and nerves plagued at her. She needed to be calm. She needed to be collected.

"I can't believe we are actually negotiating with these, humans," the pilot, a tall Faunus with goat horns curling around his ears, bitterly grumbled from beneath his pale white Grimm Ursa mask. "We should wait for Brother-Commander Taurus Adam then take the ship and the prize for ourselves."

"And risk it being shot," the co-pilot, flattening her feathered plum, shot back. "I agree with you brother. It is humiliating, but we have very few other options."

The pilot growled, but let the subject drop and soon the shuttle was drifting towards the hanger of the black ship.

"_Muninn._ This is the shuttle of the _Red Claw_. May we land?" The co-pilot radioed.

Several seconds passed. Blake forced down her panic, taking deep breaths. She would need to play her part flawlessly. Any hint that something was amiss, the pirates would stop the deal and her chance of avoiding war would have slipped through her fingers.

Even if the pirates tried to run, Adam would be arriving with the frigate _Wilt_ and several more Raiders, nearly two hundred more White Fang in total. Not even a pirate such as Raven Branwen would want to face against those numbers.

And if Adam got a hold of the Schnee… Then war was inevitable.

_Menagerie wouldn't survive against Atlas._ Blake's mood was turning dark just at the thought of it, and that was before Blake even considered what she had seen at the very edge of Wild Space.

What she had seen of Adam's newest 'ally.'

She shuddered as though a cold wind had blown through the cockpit of the shuttle. No, Blake could not fail. She steeled her spine and donned the white Grimm mask that all White Fang wore.

"No answer Sister-Lieutenant," The co-pilot reported. "Should I hail them again?"

"Hail them again," Blake ordered, "If they don't answer… Well… Then we are going to board them."

The pilot turned in seat. "There's only six of us the shuttle…"

Blake cut him off.

"We have the _Red Claw_ who will be able to fire on the _Muninn _and keep them off-balance, as well as the element of surprise. We're not going to try and take the ship, just get the Schnee and get out." Blake allowed a savage smile to cross her lips. "Are you telling me that the White Fang aren't worth a dozen pirates each? They're used to fighting against the unarmed, the weak and defenseless."

Both the pilot and copilot barked a harsh laugh at that, though it was cut short as the comms buzzed.

"Shuttle." The voice was slightly distorted and crackled with static, but was clear enough. "This is the _Muninn._ You are allowed to land."

"Finally," the copilot scoffed as the pilot turned the shuttle towards the open hanger door.

The shuttle landed with a heavy thud, the void door slamming shut behind them as the hangar was quickly repressurized.

Blake had taken five of her White Fang aboard the shuttle with her, leaving only a bare skeleton crew aboard the _Red Claw_ and all of them, including the pilot and co-pilot, stood lined up at the ramp. Blake wanted to make an impression.

The ramp lowered with a hissfrom the hydraulics as Blake stepped onto the armoured plated deck of the _Muninn_, her security following after, weapons low, but readied.

Just in case.

_Well, this is sure to build trust with our new partners, _she pessimistically mulled as she entered the dimly lit hangar bay. There was no way in the Green Hell she was going anywhere aboard Branwen's ship without some measure of protection.

To do otherwise was just asking for a knife in the back from these voidscum.

Speaking of Branwen, the Dread Pirate-Queen had come down to meet her guests personally.

Branwen was a tall woman, with dark, almost blood-red eyes and long black hair hanging down past her thin waist. She wore a short dark, crimson, almost blood red overcoat with a thin leather belt. Sheathed at her side was a short gladius sword. Perfectly suited for cutting and stabbing in an enclosed space.

And she had brought her own two tag-a-longs. Beside her was a short woman, her hair cropped close to her skull, with several tattoos and kill markings decorating her upper arms. The woman wore an arrogant smirk as she took in the sight of the White Fang. The woman's arrogant, smug demeanor immediately invoked a healthy distaste in Blake.

The last, much to Blake's surprise, was also a Faunus. A lizard? Maybe snake Faunus? Blake wasn't exactly sure. The Faunus was almost the spitting image of Branwen, save for the scale ridges on her forehead, the slitted pupil lilac eyes and the long, lush, but wild blonde hair which also hung down past her waist.

"Captain Branwen Raven Ist _Muninn_," Blake greeted the Pirate Queen with a respectful nod of her head, as she and her White Fang escort approached the three other women. She hesitated, "It is… A pleasure to finally meet you."

Branwen smiled a little at that and returned the nod.

"Belladonna Blake I presume? You do not have to greet me like that. I'm just a pirate. We don't tend to stand too much on ceremony." Branwen was patronizingly polite.

The smug woman seemed to muffle a chuckle at that, while the blonde Faunus rolled her eyes in obvious boredom.

"I suppose you wish to see the prisoner? See that I'm not leading you on?"

Blake nodded. "I will need to send something back to my leader as proof. He will trust my word."

Branwen raised a hand, indicating the blonde Faunus next to her. "Yang will take you to see her; however, I'm not going to allow more than one of you to leave this hanger. You must understand."

Blake figured this was going to be an issue. Branwen was flexing; she wanted Blake and her White Fang escorted to understand who was in charge. Whose ship they were on. Which was fine, Blake had no desire to play the game of who was top dog.

Or top cat in Blake's case.

All Blake wanted to do was get the prisoner and get out. And hopefully stop a full out war from breaking out in the Galaxy.

Simple desires really.

"That's fine." Blake shrugged, as she turned to Yang. "Lead the way,"

The Faunus woman hesitated for a second, as she seemed to wish to argue with Branwen but evidently decided it would have been a waste, as she gestured with a nod of her head for Blake to follow her.

The two travelled in relative silence for moments, through the narrow corridors, turning this way and that around the many sharp corners and turns. _Muninn_,Blake, realised was not some repurposed freighter like _Rad Claw_;she was a warship through and through.

The corners made excellent defensive positions, funnelling boarders into kill zones, and they also had the added bonus of confusing the enemy as they made their way past the critical locations; the engine room, the power generators, and the bridge. Blake considered herself to have a very good memory and an excellent sense of direction, but even she was having a difficult time remembering where they were going.

"How much longer?" Blake finally asked as she followed her guide down another short hall.

"Soon." Yang answered in a flat monotone, turning down another corner.

"I didn't know that Branwen had Faunus amongst her crew. What clan?" Blake asked her, curiosity finally getting the better of her.

"I'm not a Faunus," Yang answered, voice dripping with bitterness without looking back.

"You are not? But you look like one."

"Gene-tailoring." Yang suddenly stopped and turned to face her, a sardonic smile on her lips, her hands waving in the air. "Vat edited and genefucked."

Blake felt her temper rise. "Gene tailoring? So what are we now? Just a cast-off? A fashion statement?"

"Leave it, White Fang," Yang warned, her hands clenched into fists.

"Why? Angry that some Faunus is annoyed because you thought of us as some fetish you could imitate," Blake snapped back.

"Because it's none of your business. You really think I want to look like this?" There was a dull echoing thud, as Yang punched the armoured wall of the corridor. "Raven never really gave me much of a choice. And guess what? It turns out, screwing with someone's as an adult has some pretty significant side effects."

Yang jabbed her finger at Blake's chest. "So don't talk about what you don't know White Fang."

Blake hesitated and then nodded, dropping the subject.

Yang held her stare for a second longer, before turning on her heel. "This way."

Blake followed her through several more turns before the came to a door flanked by two pirates armed with heavy shotguns.

The blonde punched in a code and the door slid open with a hiss.

Blake nearly gasped. Sitting there in her stained and tattered white uniform, was Weiss Schnee, The Heir Apparent of the Protectorate of Atlas.

The Schnee looked up as the light poured in. Though Blake's eyes were hidden beneath her small white Grimm Mask, the two locked eyes. The prisoner's eyes were a pale ice blue, filled with defiance, with hints of fear around their edges… Those eyes were almost enough for Blake to feel pity for her.

Almost.

The Schnee was still an Atlassian. And the scars they had left on Menagerie and the Faunus still ran deep.

No, Blake would not pity her. This wasn't about pity. Or Atlas, or even completely about Menagerie. This was about the galaxy and the danger that was threatening to drown it in a tide of darkness.

"Well, there you go. One Heir Apparent of blah-blah, caged up and ready to go." Yang's tone dripped sarcasm as she shut the door. "Satisfied?"

Blake nodded. "So your captain was telling the truth."

"Raven never lies." Yang was bitter as she led Blake back to the hanger.

The trip back was just as disorienting as it had been on the way there.

_Well… looks like I'm going to need the other White Fang_. Blake silently cursed. She had been hoping for a quick infiltration and extraction. Now she was going to have to conduct a full boarding exercise with the five of her White Fang… Who she would then also have to get rid of.

Her plan was turning into a messy quagmire which she had little control over. True her original plan of infiltration did not offer a great deal more control. But it offered more than a running gunfight down those tight, maze-like corridors.

"Satisfied?" Branwen asked as Yang led Blake back into the hanger.

"I will confirm with Brother-Commander Taurus Adam, that you have Weiss Schnee," Blake said, giving her a nod. "However… I must insist that myself and the White Fang I have with me, remain on this ship."

"Not very trusting are you," Branwen goaded, crossing her arms.

"No more than you are," Blake replied evenly, her eyes catching sight of a dozen well-armed pirates emerging from the gloom in the hangar. "We will remain in our shuttle, until the rest of the White Fang arrive."

Branwen smiled a viper's grin. "Of course you are. But I'm going to keep the hangar guarded. For your own safety. You are after all my guests."

Blake paused at that. Her stomach coiled. Raven had to suspected _something_. Had she seen through her already?

Blake took a breath. She needed to keep cool. Keep calm.

"Thank you Captain Branwen Raven Ist _Muninn._" Blake bowed her head, inwardly cursing her rotten luck.

* * *

Ruby nearly jumped in surprise as the door banged opened and Yang stormed into the room. Her features were pulled into a thunderous scowl and Ruby could have sworn she could feel the heat of her rage radiating off her sister.

"Yang?"

"The White Fang is here, Rubes. You ready?" Yang asked after she had taken a moment to calm herself.

Ruby glanced over at _Crescent Rose_ now fully assembled. Several magazines, fully loaded, were laid out in neat order beside her precious rifle.

"As ready as I'll ever be," Ruby answered with a nod to her backpack by the door. Everything she had brought with her from the academy was packed away and ready to go.

"Good." Yang seemed to hesitate as she looked over at _Crescent Rose_. "Ruby…"

Ruby smiled as she patted Yang's shoulder. "Yang… I've traveled all over with dad on his old freighter. We lived on the edge of the frontier. I'm no stranger to gunfights. I can handle myself. I'm not a little girl anymore."

The: _I don't need you to look out for me like you used to_, went unsaid; but Ruby could tell Yang had heard it as clear as a thunderclap. There was a brief flash of pain in Yang's eyes, which much to Ruby's joy, quickly turned into a burning sisterly pride.

"Alright then. Let's go over your plan one last time," Yang said as she took a seat on her cot.

Ruby rolled her silver eyes but smiled. "Okay step one: Get the prisoner her weapons back. You will head down to the armoury, subdue the guard there, then come back here for me. Step two, we head down to the brig… fighting our way down there if we have to."

"Getting the weapons shouldn't be much of a problem. Gris, the armourer, likes me. _A lot_. If I can, I'll try and get the explosives too… though no promises. If I do, I'll plant some charges throughout the ship," Yang added.

Ruby nodded. "Step three, rescue the 'princess' and book it to the hanger. Step four, take care of the White Fang."

"That's when I'll detonate the explosives if we have 'em," Yang chimed in as she stood up and went to her locker, sliding several magazines for her pistol into belt.

Ruby nodded again, "Step five, take the White Fang shuttle back to the White Fang ship."

"I've seen the readout on it. It looks like a small freighter. There shouldn't be more than a dozen on her. Including the six on-board the _Muninn_ right now," Yang added, as she closed her now empty locker and slipped on her brown leather jacket.

"Which leads us to step six, we take the ship then Fold out of here," Ruby finished as she picked up her loaded magazines and clipped them to her belt. " You ready?"

Yang looked over at her sister, then gave a single nod, before punching her fist together. " Always. Let's do this."

* * *

The door to the armoury hissed open as Yang stepped inside. Rifles, shotguns, pistols and various blades decorated the inside of the locked cage. The smell of gun oil, the click of parts being taken apart, cleaned, then reassembled filled the still air. An older man, grey with age, heavyset, dressed in clothes stained with years of grease and cleaning lubes barely looked up to acknowledge her as Yang walked in.

"Yang." The man grunted before turning back to his work.

"Hey Gris. You still got that Schnee's weapon?" Yang asked as she approached the cage.

The man gestured with a grunt and a sideways nod of his head to the far table. Laying there was the rapier with basket hilt. Beside it was a slim, beautifully decorated pistol still in its white leather holster.

"Beautiful isn't she." Gris said admiringly, as he picked up the rapier and held it up to the light. "Vinbranium micro woven with nerosteel. Strong, supple, light as a feather. But capable of piercing anything short of full Atlassian Marine boarding plate and shield."

Yang rolled her eyes, but kept quiet. She knew better than to interrupt Gris when it came to weapons. The old man could wax poetic for hours at a time, his eyes lighting up with pure joy as he rattled off calibres, stopping power, rates of fire, explosives, blade lengths, metal alloys and cutting potential.

If his poetics were interrupted, the stubborn old man would become sour and ill-tempered, which would make it that much more difficult to get anything out of him. So even though Yang was now on a schedule, it was easier just to let him talk.

"And this… Never in all my days did I think I would ever see one with my own eyes." He pulled the slim pistol from its holster. "An _Arma Gigas_. Handcrafted by the pinnacle of Atlassian gunsmiths. Small, you wouldn't think this thing was more than an over-engineered pea-shooter. But let me tell you, if less than half of the things I have heard about these are true… This is a man stopper. Not a great many things alive this piece couldn't put down."

Gris looked over at Yang and grinned at her bored expression; as he placed the pistol back into its holster. "I mean… Not as well as that cannon on your hip. But still she'll do her job. And do it well."

"Interesting and all." Yang tried not to let urgency colour her tone, "but I'm not interested in a weapons lesson. I'm just here because I want them."

Gris eyed her carefully as he leaned back. "Is that so? Well… I'm sorry to tell you that Vernal already claimed the rapier. The pistol is going to Raven. She wants it as a trophy."

"Well… I don't really care. I want them." Yang lowered her tone to a near whisper. Gris was probably the only friend Yang had on this ship, outside of her sister. She hoped he would catch her meaning.

"Vernal wanted the pistol too. Before Raven claimed it as a trophy." Gris continued as though he hadn't heard her, "Wanted it bad. Lucky for her I was here to set her straight. You see the _Arma Gigas_ are gene-coded for the one she's made for. If anyone else then the Schnee was to pull the trigger… well… they would have to get used to wiping their ass with the other hand."

"Gris…" Yang warned, her temper slowly getting the better of her. "I need those weapons."

Gris eyed her dispassionately. "And I can't allow you to take them."

"You aren't going to be able to stop me."

The man shrugged. "You can't shoot me. If you do, everyone is going to know about it."

Yang's eyes widened as she caught his meaning. "So I am going to have to hit you. Put you down hard."

"Probably break a few bones in the process." Gris agreed.

"I… I'm sorry Gris."

"Tear the cage door open when you do it," he continued as though he hadn't heard her. Shuffling tools around, placing them almost delicately back into the various toolboxes stacked around the armoury cage. "You're more than strong enough."

He paused, looked up at Yang. "Your sister... always gave me the creeps… Something's not right about her, be careful. I'm sticking my head out for you with the Captain. I won't be around to help with her."

"Ruby's all I got left Gris." Yang almost snarled, but managed to choke it back. "I burned too many bridges back home… And I'm nuking the ones here with an orbital strike."

Yang reached up and grabbed the cage door, then ripped it from its hinges in one savage pull.

She looked down at Gris as he turned his back on her. "I'm sorry about this… I really am."

Then Yang threw a haymaker into the side of his head. Gris did not even try to defend himself, merely curling up into a ball, as Yang rained heavy blows into his body.

Bile rose up in Yang's throat as she and Ruby raced down the claustrophobic corridor. She tried to drive the feeling of her fists smashing into a defenceless Gris, of bones snapping and the muffled screams of pain from her mind.

Gris was tough. He would be okay, she told herself; as the two sisters with Yang in the lead, charged down another hallway.

She began to slow down. They had been lucky so far, the two of them managing to avoid wandering pirates, but now they were coming up onto the brig. There would be guards and they were going to have to be dealt with.

As soon as Ruby or Yang fired, the ship would be alerted that something was happening in the lower decks. Yang guessed they would have only have a couple of minutes before Raven sent every pirate she could down there.

Probably less.

Raven was a suspicious woman. She'd probably think the White Fang was going to make a play of their own.

Getting to the hangar… That was going to be the interesting part.

Yang came to a stop, just before the corner to the brig. Ruby almost slammed into Yang as she too skidded to a halt, pressing her back against the wall.

"Alright… Just around here is the brig. Should only be two guards." Yang whispered as she pulled _Ember Celica _from her holster. "I'll move first to draw their fire. You cover me, got it?"

"Got it," Ruby whispered back, as she brought _Crescent Rose_ to a ready position, then tapped Yang on the shoulder to let her know she was ready.

Yang turned the corner, levelling her pistol as she did. The two guards looked up, eyes widening in surprise as they did. _Ember Celica _roared once, catching the first in the chest with a large, heavy slug.

The man's chest exploded open, dropping to the ground in a wet splatter of meat and viscera. The second guard was fumbling to raise his shotgun when a three-round burst from Ruby, who must have stepped out with her, caught him the chest.

The guard collapsed like a marionette with its strings cut.

"Thought I said I would move first?" Yang asked as the two rushed to the door.

"You also said to cover you," Ruby replied sweetly as she kicked the shotguns away from the guards' bodies.

"Fair," Yang grinned, as the door to the brig opened shedding light into the dark prison.

The Schnee glanced up as the light stung her eyes. Yang was already moving and with a powerful tug, she ripped the bars from the cell.

"Well… as promised here we are. Ruby give the Heir her weapons," Yang said as she took cover inside the door. "Sorry princess we got to move, and move quick. Think you can keep up?"

"I can handle myself," The Schnee snapped.

Yang risked a glance back, frowning slightly as the Schnee flinched when Ruby offered her the rapier and pistol, slapping Ruby's hand away as she climbed to her feet.

Ruby for her part seemed unaffected by the rude gesture and merely shrugged.

"Alright we ready?" Ruby asked as she took cover across from Yang.

"Yeah…" Yang nodded, as she gave what she hoped was a reassuring smile.

The Schnee glared at Ruby as she tested the draw in her rapier. "Who are you?"

"Oh, I'm sorry," Ruby apologised, as she held out her hand again. "I'm Ruby Rose. I'm here to rescue you."

The Schnee looked down at the hand and shuddered slightly as though someone had offered something rather unrecognisable and offensive on a stick. Yang frowned and was about to reprimand the Schnee, when she caught Ruby's eye and gentle shake of her head.

_Time and place, Yang._

"Ahhh no worries." Ruby giggled, "not everyone has an appreciation for the classics."

Yang snorted. "You mean ancient vids that no one understands anymore."

Ruby nodded as she led the way out of the brig. "That too."

* * *

"What is that?" One of the White Fang asked as klaxon alarms began to blast throughout the hanger.

A second later Blake's sensitive ears picked up another sound. One she had sadly become very accustomed to over the past few years.

_Gunfire_.

"Someone's shooting," Blake answered as she grabbed her weapons from the locker. "Quick, get your weapons and get to cover. The pirates might think it's us behind this and I don't want unwelcome visitors thinking they can come and take our shuttle."

While the other White Fang got to cover in the hold, Blake took a chance and ducked out from the shuttle. Keeping down and to the shadows, she made her way behind a large stack of crates.

She took a peek and cursed.

A dozen or so heavily armed pirates had gathered in the hangar, in preparation to storm and take the shuttle.

Suddenly the shipped bucked. The power died and red lights flashed as emergency lighting and secondary power sources came alive. The pirates scattered for the most part. Running to their station, to bring systems back online, preparing for what could be a boarding action.

And in doing so, only leaving a token force to watch the hanger and the White Fang.

_If they do that could work out in my favour._ Blake thought to herself as she kept herself low and made her way back to the shuttle hold. _We kill enough of them here, we could make a break for the Schnee's cell_.

"Lights went out. What's happening?" One of her Sister's whispered from across the hold.

"Maybe Brother-Commander Taurus has arrived? Maybe he is leading a boarding party."

Blake didn't think so.

"Brother-Commander Taurus would have told me if he was planning something like this." Blake whispered back, "now keep quiet and-"

The sound of gunfire outside interpreted Blake and the next thing she heard was booted feet running across the armoured decking of the black ship.

"Quick, let's move. Come on princess keep up!" Someone loud and boisterous called.

Blake thought she recognised the voice of that not-Faunus vat freak, Tang, or Jang, whatever her name was, as she stormed up the shuttle ramp.

Behind her, two other pairs of feet followed close behind as three humans charged into the hold. One of whom was the Heir Apparent.

Blake leapt up, pistol levelled. Her five kin joining her. The three intruders, the blonde not-Faunus, a small brunette with red highlights and a long scarlet cape and of course, Weiss Schnee, the Heir Apparent, were surrounded and outgunned.

"Well… Shit." The blonde grimaced as the three humans found themselves surrounded.

"Wonderful, from pirates to White Fang all in the span of less than ten minutes." The Schnee complained as her pistol bounced from kin to kin. "Great job."

"I should thank you for bringing us Weiss Schnee." Blake smiled coldly beneath her mask as she stepped from cover. "You have done the White Fang a great service."

Then she turned on her heel, levelling her pistol at one of her Brothers. The pistol barked, striking the White Fang in the head, sending him crashing down.

The White Fang sat there, stunned, as they struggled to process what had happened. Blake gunned down another, then another.

The three humans, not looking a gift horse in its mouth, raised their own weapons. In less than five seconds, all the White Fang lay dead and three armed women were now pointing their weapons at Blake.

Blake shook her head. Taking off her mask she allowed amber eyes to meet silver, lilac and ice blue. "We don't have time. Assuming you are responsible for those explosions, it won't take them long to get the ship back up to full power."

"She's right." The silver-eyed girl with the red cape spoke up. Blake felt herself shivering uncomfortably as the girl got closer. There was something… off about the girl. Something Blake could not put a finger on.

Just a general feeling of offness.

"What do you suggest then?" The girl asked, lowering her rifle.

Blake shook off the feeling. "You were going to try and take the _Red Claw_ weren't you?"

All three nodded.

"Let me join you." Blake pushed, "you can tell them you took me hostage. There's only four of them on board. We can take them, then escape."

"Why should we trust you?" The Schnee interrupted. "You just murdered your friends, Faunus. Why?"

"We don't have time for this." Blake snapped back. "Either trust me or don't. But I can help you."

The Schnee opened her mouth to interject but was cut off by red cape.

"She's right. We don't have a choice. I can fly us."

"Well… That went simpler than planned." The blonde grinned cheekily as she pushed passed her to join the red-caped girl in the cockpit, leaving Blake alone with the Schnee.

"I don't know what your plan is White Fang. But for now, it doesn't matter. I will be watching you though." The Schnee hissed as she went to join her allies.

The shuttle roared to life. A second later, the hanger boomed as the small railguns underneath it blasted open the void doors, shredding them like paper before the engines ignited and the shuttle blasted out into the void.

Ruby grimaced as the last of the remaining White Fang was nearly blasted apart by a close-range shot from Yang's pistol. It hadn't taken much to get them to cooperate. The cat Faunus had told the truth. They now had a ship, courtesy of the White Fang.

Ruby ran to the cockpit and jumped into the pilot's seat… And then froze.

She had never seen anything like this before. The shuttle was simple enough. Though somewhat unfamiliar, the controls were simple enough to figure out. These… These were a mess.

"What's wrong Ruby?" Yang asked as she jumped into the co-pilot chair beside her.

Ruby looked up, panic welling in her chest. "Uhhh… Well… I think I found the flaw in our plan. I'm not entirely sure on how to fly this thing."

"What!" the white-haired girl screeched behind them. "You can't fly this?"

"I didn't say that!" Ruby shot back defensively. "I said I'm not entirely sure on how to. I thought that after flying my dad's old freighter and the fighter sims at the academy that this piece of junk would be similar, but…"

"My Gods… I'm going to die here," Ms. Schnee loudly whispered to herself as she collapsed into another chair. "I'm going to die being blown to bits because some frontier bumpkin thought too much of herself."

"Hey!"

"I don't want to interrupt," the Faunus called out. "But the _Muninn _is coming around on us. I got energy signatures spiking. She's readying her main guns."

"Aw...Fucking Void…" Yang snapped. "Where are the shields on this thing?"

Yang fumbled with several switches. While Ruby frantically pushed several more, suddenly the ship shook, tossing the four around as the _Red Claw _buckled from a heavy hit.

"_Muninn_ just hit us!" The Faunus girl called from a screen in front of her. "Port side aft."

"Never mind the shields, Yang. Just punch in the Fold coordinates!" Ruby yelled as she grabbed the control stick and opened the accelerator.

The White Fang ship hummed as the engines roared into life. The _Red Claw _took off, but the _Muninn _followed close behind.

"_Muninn_ steadily gaining. Energy spiking. She's going to fire," The Faunus girl reported, fear slowly growing more apparent in her voice.

The_ Red Claw_ shook violently again. The four women could hear the hull twisting and groaning as the shot sheared the armoured plating.

"Grazing shot. Top deck. Port side."

The ship shook again with another devastating blow. "Direct hit. Port side. Aft."

Ruby's eyes went wide as she realised what that meant. "They're aiming for the Fold drive. Yang! We need those coordinates now!"

"I'm trying, I'm trying!" Yang yelled back, "I need some time!"

"We don't have time you blonde brute!" Ms. Schnee snarled, "White Fang, does this ship have a torpedo?"

Behind Ruby the cat Faunus looked up from her screen and nodded. "Several but only one loaded in a tube."

"Dolt!" Ms. Schnee kicked Ruby's chair to indicate that she was talking to her. "Get some distance, then bring us around. I was top in my torpedo class. I can hit the _Muninn._"

Ruby shook her head. "_Muninn's_ too fast. We won't get enough space. Besides one torpedo? It would get picked off by the point defence before it came within a hundred kilometres... But we can buy us some time."

She pulled the stick hard and the _Red Claw _turned. Right into the teeth of the _Muninn_. "Ms. Schnee get ready."

"We're little more than a dozen kilometres. It's too short for an effective torpedo shot." Ms. Schee snapped.

"We don't need an effective shot. All we need is the radiation blindness." Ruby shot back.

The Schnee paused. Then grinned. "A good plan. The name is Weiss by the way."

"Ruby… But I already told you that…" Ruby grinned back, as she pushed the _Red Claw_ into her attack run.

Radiation blindness could happen rather often in space. It was when a burst of radiation hit your ship's sensors; which would cause them to malfunction for a brief periods of time, leaving nothing but static and white noise on the viewing screens. It was something that could happen a number of ways: a bad solar wind, a nebula, a passing bit of space junk.

Or in the case of the _Muninn _when a fifty kiloton nuclear warhead got swatted out of space by numerous point defence weapons. Then detonated less than a few kilometres in front of your ship.

The effect would be like a flash-bang going off in a small room, as opposed to a steady degradation of system at war with constant reboots and scrubs. The sensors of the _Muninn_ would be flooded by dirty, polluted light and a backwash of harsh radiation, rendering her blind for several precious seconds.

_Red Claw_ did not escape through the maneuver unscathed, however. One last shot smashed into her prow; the spine of the ship rocked, cracked and crumpled. Sparks jumped, fires were started and Ruby knew that the last shot had been a near fatal one. But they had blasted through and the _Muninn_ was still blind.

"Yang! Please tell me you got something," Ruby pleaded as the precious seconds her maneuver had bought them were spent.

"Yeah! Got it! Were good now! Ready to Fold on your mark!"

Ruby looked down at her watch. "All aboard Air Ruby. Folding in three, two, one. Mark."

Space, time, gravity. Billions upon billions of kilometres were pulled into a singularity of space and time. _Red Claw_ shot forward, bearing her precious cargo.

They were safe.

For now.


	4. Caviis IV

**Chapter Four:** _Caviis IV_

The _Red Claw_ slammed out of the Fold, on fire and drifting. Her sublight engines flickered and died as the ship listed heavily to port. The cockpit a mess of tangled wires, the smell of cooked electronics and the stench of burning ozone.

They were alive.

True, they were without power, the Fold Drive was probably damaged beyond repair; and she was sure that neither the blonde brute, the black-haired Faunus or the off-putting girl in the red-cape had a spare one stashed somewhere. But surviving was a start.

Weiss collapsed into her seat as the thought hit her. She was alive, they had escaped Raven and the _Muninn_. There was a hiss of a fire suppressor as the Faunus woman hosed down an electrical fire that had sprung from behind the console she had been sitting at.

"Well…" the blonde, Yang, Weiss believed, began, as she looked back and gave a tired grin. "That could have gone better."

"We're alive. That counts for something." Ruby crossed her arms behind her head and leaned back, smiling, as though she was basking in the glory of her great accomplishment of not getting them all killed.

"Alive, but trapped in a tin can with no engines, little power and so heavily damaged I'm surprised we even survived that Fold," Weiss interjected, providing a preverbal needle to Ruby's inflated sense of accomplishment.

"Hey! Considering what we were up against, " Yang shot back as she climbed from the copilot's chair. "We just escaped from Raven Branwen and the White Fang. I think we've earned a bit of a pat on the back."

"Back patting?" Weiss arched an eyebrow before she gestured to the state of the cockpit. She worked to bury her own panic and anxiety. It wouldn't do if the other three could see how terrified she actually was. Weiss needed to present a cool, calm and collected front.

"Yes." Weiss continued cooly, "We have most definitely earned that. Escaping certain doom, to… oh: near-certain doom from either thirst or starvation if we can't get the engines back online."

Weiss looked down to Ruby and then back to Yang. It was obvious that someone needed to take charge of this little group of misfits. She couldn't trust the brute who had murdered her crewmember, the less said of the Faunus the better. And Ruby, while competent, if a little over-enthusiastic, was too immature. If any of them were to survive, she would have to assume command.

"Ruby, take the Faunus and see if you can find out what's wrong with the engines. Yang, check the Fold Drive. Raven was able to hit that area a couple of times and, seeing as you were unable to get our shields up, it's most likely been damaged. I will do a…"

"Wait, hold on. " Yang's tone lowered to a dangerous octave as she glared at the heiress. "Who put you in charge, princess?"

"And this Faunus has a name, Atlassian," the cat Faunus hissed from behind her, "Don't forget who also helped you to escape."

Weiss sniffed as she straightened her back, attempting to intimidate the larger, hulking woman. An attempt, she noted, that was horrifically lost when Weiss realised she only came to just above the blonde savage's well-developed bosom.

Nevertheless, Weiss stood her ground. "I am taking control due to the fact that I am the only one here qualified to do so."

She turned to the Faunus with a polite bow of her head. "I am sorry, Faunus. But I do not know your name."

"That's Blake," Yang answered, no doubt annoyed that she had been so casually dismissed, "but you and me aren't finished here, Weiss. Considering the last time you were in charge you got locked up in the brig."

"Belladonna Zech Blake Ist Dawn Hope," the Faunus woman corrected, clearly becoming impatient with Yang.

"Like I said. Blake," Yang said with a dismissive shrug, before turning back to Weiss. "Like I was saying you wouldn't have gotten anywhere if it wasn't for me and Rubes."

"And all of you would have been captured and killed if not for me," Belladonna snapped angrily. "I betrayed my Brothers and Sisters for you."

"Why?"

All three stopped as Ruby spoke up from the pilot seat, turning to look at the arguing women. Weiss had to suppress an uncomfortable shudder as Ruby's wide silver eyes met hers before sliding over to Belladonna, who was seemingly unable to hide her own distaste at the aura of wrongness that radiated from the young girl.

It made Weiss wonder: What was so unsettling about her? She was cheerful, a little obnoxious, immature and overly cheerful to be sure. But that didn't account for how… disturbed Ruby made Weiss. Not like the vat-freak Yang, or the terrorist Faunus. It was something more. Less physical, more like a gut feeling that something was not quite right with the girl.

"Why what?" Belladonna asked sharply pulling Weiss back to the present discussion.

"Why did you help us?" Ruby repeated, "I don't know much about the White Fang. I mean, you think of each other almost as family, and we're just humans. One of us is even Atlassian. So why?"

Belladonna was silent for a moment. Then she took in a shuddering breath.

"Because Menagerie wouldn't survive if the White Fang killed the Schnee," Belladonna said with a wave of her hand at Weiss. "If the Heir Apparent was executed, the Protectorate would use it as an excuse to invade the Menagerie Systems. We, the Faunus, the White Fang… We don't have the numbers or resources to even give them pause."

Weiss snorted with a dismissive wave of her hand. "If Atlas did take such a direct retaliatory action, the other powers; Vale, The Vacuo Union, the Empire of Mistral, all of them would be forced to act. None of them want the Protectorate in the Menagerie Systems. Especially after what you White Fang did on Ophion a year ago."

Belladonna continued on as she ignored the interruption, "It would be a massacre for the Faunus, ending with either every one of us dead or back in slave chains working in the Protectorate's foundries and mines. Meanwhile, the galaxy would be torn apart in another Great War."

She paused then, her eyes shifting back and forth between the three of them. Weiss was about to snap at her to stop stalling and spit out what more she was hiding when she took a breath, licked the top of her lip and plunged on.

"Besides there is something worse out there." Her words were hurried and she often stumbled over them as though chasing a half-believed memory. "My… my leader, Brother-Commander Taurus Naut Adam Ist White Fang… he made an ally out here in Wild Space. An ally who… Gods of Sanctuary… I barely believe this myself. But he has an ally who can command the Grimm."

Silence hung in the cockpit for several long seconds.

Then Yang laughed and the silence shattered like a fragile, crystalline glass. Weiss couldn't help herself as her own lips pulled into a grin, at the sheer absurdity of it.

"Controlling the Grimm," Yang chortled as she wiped a tear from her eye. "I'm sorry Blakey but that's a good one. You had me. You had me for a moment."

"I know it's hard to believe…"

"Impossible to believe," Weiss curtly interrupted with a chopping gesture, "the Grimm are mindless beasts. You cannot control them."

"I have seen them!" Belladonna shouted back pausing to take a breath, "I have seen the woman control them. They follow her every instruction, every command. It's even worse than that. And… Taurus is gathering White Fang there. With High-Leader Khan's approval."

Weiss couldn't believe the tale that this Belladonna was weaving… well… no. She _could _believe that some techno-barbarians like the Faunus could think someone could control the Grimm. A few light projectors, a hologram or two and superstitious savages would be falling over themselves to ally themselves with someone who could claim to 'control the Grimm.'

But superstition could be dangerous if that person was using it to gather the White Fang. That was a danger that needed to be addressed. Quickly. If not, the raiders would be able to strike deep into Protectorate territory. Maybe as far as the core worlds. The fleet was vast, but even it couldn't be everywhere at once. What had happened at Ophion, would break across a hundred more worlds.

That could not be allowed to happen.

"How though? How can someone control the Grimm?" Ruby asked, frowning worriedly. Weiss couldn't help but snort. Of course, the bumpkin would believe it.

"I don't know," Belladonna sounded terrified as she shrugged helplessly. "Tech? Dark magic? Witchcraft? I don't know. Does it matter?"

She looked back over at Weiss. "I know asking an Atlassian to help the Faunus is fighting a black hole. I know that this idea of some magic woman controlling the Grimm is insane. But the White Fang is gathering strength on the edge of Wild Space. I don't need to tell you how dangerous that is, Schnee."

"So what do you want, Belladonna?" Weiss asked after a moment of silence.

"Come with me. Come and see what's happening. Then you can warn the Protectorate," The Faunus eyes were wide, almost pleadingly.

"Why can't you warn them, Blake?" Yang asked, ignoring the angry and frustrated frown Belladonna shot her.

Weiss answered for her, as it was her duty to instruct the savage. "The Lord and Lady Marshalls of the Protectorate would never take the word of a Faunus."

If Belladonna was annoyed at being spoken for, she didn't show it. She merely nodded in agreement. "But if the Heir Apparent was to give first-hand evidence, along with the women who helped rescue her, the Protectorate would have to respond."

"Okay." Ruby chirped, speaking up before anyone else. "I'm in."

"Ruby?" Yang rounded on her sister in surprise, "You can't be serious."

Ruby looked up at Yang then motioned with a nod of her head to the hold. "A word please?"

Yang looked like she was about to protest, but shrugged and followed the smaller woman out.

Weiss eyed Belladonna for several moments, glaring at the red wolf's head and three claw marks emblazoned on the woman's white and grey uniform.

Belladonna for her part, returned the glare as the two settled into an uneasy, silent stalemate.

The White Fang was nothing but pirates. Zealots. Mass murdering thugs and terrorists.

But now she was indebted to one. One who had recently left the White Fang, certainly, but a good deed did not wash blood-stained hands clean.

"Belladonna Blake," Weiss broke the uneasy silence with a polite bow of her head. "I don't trust you. I don't like that you show up seemingly out of the void as the one person who can not only help us escape from Raven but also just happens to dump an extraordinary piece of intelligence into my lap. But… You did save me. You betrayed your own…"

Belladonna raised a hand. "Don't say it. I know what I did. I knew some of those Brothers and Sisters since before I first joined. I didn't do it for you. I didn't do it for the Protectorate or any human, for that matter. I did it for the Faunus. "

Weiss nodded, letting the subject of their rescue drop. "I will still thank you for what you did and it is because of that, and the grave danger the White Fang represents, I will go to this planet with you to ascertain this threat. I will speak on your behalf to the Council of Marshalls if your claims are true."

She held out a hand. For a moment Belladonna stared at it, then, gingerly, took it. Sealing the pact between the two, between the former White Fang terrorist and Atlassian officer.

* * *

Ruby lead Yang through the hold, stepping over the fallen wires, broken cargo and ruptured armour. She grimaced in sympathetic pain with the ship. Though a total inspection would be needed, it was doubtful that the _Red Claw _would be able to survive many more Folds or even be void worthy at all. But that was a problem for another time.

"Yang," Ruby turned to her sister when she was sure they were alone and in no danger of being overheard by their two other crewmates. "We have to help them."

Yang shook her head. "No, we don't. We already helped them, Ruby. We got them out of there. What we need to do is leave and go somewhere else. Away from Wild Space. Somewhere Raven can't come after us."

"So we're running?" Ruby asked, unable to believe what she was hearing coming from her tough as nails sister.

"No. It's just- This isn't our fight," Yang huffed angrily as she sat down on a piece of wreckage. "It's the White Fang and the Protectorate's fight. We got nothing to gain and a lot to lose."

"Sounds like we're running." Ruby sat down beside Yang, voice filled with concern. "That's not you, Yang. You don't run from fights. You always took them head-on. Better or for worse."

"Ruby...All I know is that I can't lose you. I've lost everyone else. Dad, Qrow, Gris, Raven. You're the only one I got left." Yang put her arm around Ruby's shoulders and pulled her in a tight hug. "We'll help the Princess and Blakey get a ship, then we'll get our own. Maybe head to Vacuo or Mistral, see what trouble we can stir up there."

The two were quiet for a moment, then Ruby pushed Yang's arm off and stood up.

"Ruby? What is it?" Yang asked. Ruby could tell she was trying not to sound hurt.

"I know what you did on Raven's ship."

Yang stiffened; Ruby could see the panic rising in her sister's eyes. It tore Ruby's heart out to see Yang actually frightened, but she pushed on regardless. Yang needed to hear this.

"I know what you did. I know you killed someone."

"Ruby please…" Yang tried to interrupt the tears forming in her eyes but was stopped as Ruby raised a hand.

"I was scared of you. Horrified that you could do something like that and for a second I thought you were exactly like them. And that hurt Yang. More than you running away, more than anything since mom died."

Yang flinched, each word hitting her like a physical blow, and Ruby knew that this could destroy her sister. But she had to press on, if she didn't Ruby felt like she would lose her sister to this new, frightening and bitter Yang.

"I didn't know what to do. All I knew was that I wanted the old Yang back, and I was terrified that I had lost her forever... Then I saw that little picture. That crayon drawing I made you when I was four."

Ruby sat back down and hugged her sister. "I knew that you weren't some monster. I knew that you were not one of them. You weren't Raven. You were still Yang. Still my older brash, hot-headed, stubborn sister Yang. Sure, that Yang could do silly, stupid things, but she would always try and do what's right. That Yang wouldn't abandon people in need. She would have charged in head first, fists swinging. Please… Give me that Yang back."

Ruby smiled a little. "I'm not going to abandon you either. You are my sister too. You're all I got out here as well."

Yang wiped the tears forming as she hugged her sister back. "I'm sorry Ruby. I'm so sorry."

Ruby didn't say anything. She didn't need to, so she just held her sister.

They sat there for several moments as Yang tried to reign in her emotions, taking deep long breaths. Finally, Yang looked up and wiped her face. A small grin slowly stretching her tear-streaked cheeks.

"I'm still going to ask the princess for a buttload of money." Yang grinned as she stood up.

Ruby laughed as she hopped to her feet. "If she will even agree to that."

Yang shrugged as she walked back to the cockpit. "Why not? I'm me!"

* * *

Weiss wiped the sweat from her brow, leaving a streak of grease and grit. Her nose wrinkled with the smell of burning electronics, as Ruby stripped the burnt power cables away and replaced them with fresh wiring. There was a hiss from the electro-spanner and the faint glow of light blue sparks as Ruby worked on the Fold Drive's sensitive circuitry.

The last several days had been… stressful to say the least.

Repairs were slow, due mostly to the constant headbutting. If Yang wasn't being a vulgar extortionist, then Belladonna was sneaking around and questioning everything that Weiss was doing. It didn't help that both Yang and Belladonna seemed to also be constantly arguing about one thing or another.

Or to be more accurate, Yang would loudly complain and Belladonna would either ignore her, get into an argument, or get annoyed and sneak off to work someplace more quiet.

Weiss was at her wit's end.

She had tried to take command, tried to get the rest to listen to her. Yang had been happy enough to follow her lead after Weiss had, very grudgingly accepted Yang's demanded 'Princess Rescue and Bodyguard Service' fee. However, Yang, it seemed, was more interested in teasing and annoying their resident Faunus. As well as testing what buttons she could push with Weiss, her new employer.

Belladonna, for her part, was paranoid and suspicious, often questioning or ignoring Weiss's instructions and plans; instead preferring to stalk off somewhere else to work or find some other task to complete. Usually alone.

And Ruby… Was Ruby.

Thankfully, she seemed to have some coherent ideas about what needed to be done, so she required little supervision.

Weiss still tried to help.

But in truth, the Protectorate, or to be more specific, her father's tutors, had not included classes on ship repair or electrical engineering. So it wasn't entirely her fault when she handed Ruby an arc-wrench, when Ruby had asked for a circuit-infuser. For the seventh or so time.

Though to be perfectly honest, Weiss did not want to be working with the girl. Not because Weiss didn't like her. No. Weiss actually found herself warming up to the girl. Despite her initial assessment of Ruby being somewhat more negative, Weiss had to admit that Ruby was competent. She was clearly skilled in what makeshift repairs they could do with their rather limited resources. Ruby had a good head on her shoulders too, despite her immaturity.

No, it was that Ruby made her… uncomfortable. Not in the way Ruby's vat-grown sister did. That was a purely physical reaction to the 'gene-fucking' as Yang so vulgary called it.

The feeling of otherness from Ruby's was more subtle. Like a stranger stepping on your shadow. Or the feeling of someone you cannot see, watching you.

It was upsetting for reasons Weiss could not fully understand. That intrigued her.

"Well that's going to be about all we're gonna be able to do," Ruby muttered, sounding annoyed. "If we had been able to get shields up this would have been simple but noooo."

Weiss stood up, collecting tools and broken parts as she did. "Well? Are you going to tell me what you did? Or just complain?"

Ruby shrugged angrily and let out a frustrated breath, "I managed to get us some power to the Fold Drive. Problem is, she's not in great shape. Neither is the ship. We can make three, maybe four Folds before either the Drive explodes or the ship's hull falls apart. I don't know about you, Weiss, but I'm not really interested in finding out which one goes first."

"That would make two of us," Weiss agreed, following the strange woman to the cockpit. She frowned as the two found Yang sitting in the copilot's chair, her feet kicked up on the dashboard, slowly chewing on a nutrient bar.

"Well?" Yang asked through a mouthful of dried, tasteless nutrient bar ration pack, from their dwindling supplies.

Weiss ignored her question. "Where's Belladonna?"

"Somewhere." Yang shrugged, sounding bored. "Blakey got huffy for some reason, then wandered off to another part of the ship."

"That's because you keep insulting her," Ruby piped up.

"As I told you three or four days ago," Weiss reminded her 'bodyguard,' "Faunus names are particular, and you are being incredibly informal with her."

"I'm a pirate. Just seems overly complicated." Yang laughed around a mouthful of the nutrient bar.

"We're kinda stuck together," Ruby pleaded, "Can we just try to get along?"

Yang rolled her eyes but smiled reassuringly. "Okay, okay. I'll try."

The door slid open with a hiss as the joined them. Weiss immediately noticed Belladonna had changed out of the White Fang uniform. She now wore a long, twin-tailed white coat with a dark purple lining. Her boots were heeled and her top was short, exposing her midriff.

Weiss hand pressed into her forehead in frustration, as Yang let out an appreciative wolf whistle

"Hey Blakey! So that's where you been." Yang smiled and waved.

Belladonna frowned but quickly schooled her emotions; adopting the emotionally distant persona the three had come to know. "Xiao Long Yang, I have asked you to please stop being so informal. We don't know each other, you have no right to call me 'Blakey.'"

Yang rolled her eyes with a teasing grin. "Alright, alright. Fine. I'm sorry Belladonna."

Belladonna held the blonde's eyes for several more seconds before she nodded her acceptance of the apology.

"I inspected the fuel lines. Most were damaged and the fuel pumps were disengaged. I managed to patch one of the pumps…" Belladonna trailed off.

"The ship's pretty much a wreck," Ruby finished for her. "I just told Weiss, we maybe have three or so Folds left before this ship either falls apart or explodes."

"So we're dead?" Belladonna asked grimly.

"Not necessarily." Yang's grin was smug as she brought up the star charts. "I managed to Fold us fairly close to Caviis IV. We're no more than two, maybe two-and-a-half Folds away."

"What's Caviis IV? And wouldn't Raven be looking for us there? And why didn't you Fold us in the planetary system?" Weiss asked as she studied the holographic chart. "She knows we couldn't have Folded that far from her, and after the damage we sustained, we would need a harbour."

"Yeah, buuuut…. We got three things going for us. One: She has no idea where we are and two: Caviis IV is home to several gangs who… well… they hate Raven more than they hate each other. And while Raven is tough, ruthless, vengeful and cunning; she knows when she's beat. The _Muninn_ is only one ship. She wouldn't be able to take on a small armada of pirates. Which is why I avoided dropping us in the system. If they found us in this near-derelict of a craft, we would have ended back at square one. In pirate chains."

"Gangs?" Ruby asked curiously peeking over Yang's shoulder. "What kind of gangs?"

"Mostly pirate, and most loyal to the crime families and syndicates in Mistral. Which leads us to the third thing." Yang held up her fingers. "Where there are syndicates, there's Slot smugglers. Caviis IV has been used as a popular stopping point for them."

"Slot?" Weiss almost screeched. "Grimmaphage? Are you insane?"

Weiss grimaced, Grimmaphage, or Slot as it was commonly called, was highly illegal in all civilized areas of space; baring the Union, but that went without saying. Grimmaphage was a mix of stimulant and hallucinogenic made from several chemicals found commonly in Wild Space and was distilled from Grimm blood. Taken in small doses it left the user hyper-aware, filled with energy, having pleasant visions. It gave increased strength, speed, and reaction time. Too much though… Well… Pleasant dreams can easily become mind breaking nightmares.

"A little," Yang's smile turned crooked, "But hey. Unless you got a better idea for finding us a ship to get us all the way to the edge of Grimm Space then back to Atlas, I'm waiting for it. Besides, the smugglers aren't that bad… Unless they've been sampling the product."

Weiss had to admit, she didn't have a better plan. Still, she wasn't overly excited to put her hands into drug smugglers, especially those in the pockets of Mistralian crime syndicates. But it appeared there was very little choice.

"I agree with Xiao Long," Belladonna spoke up from behind them, "We need a ship."

"Yep." Ruby cheerily added, popping the 'p.' "Besides, we took on Raven. What chances do a bunch of smugglers got against us?"

Weiss sighed. She didn't like this, not one bit. But she was outvoted. More importantly, she had come to realize, they were right. Yang, Belladonna, Ruby, her; without a ship they were stuck. Caviis IV it was.

Not that she had to like it.

* * *

Blake groaned inwardly and resigned herself to another round of angry negotiations, as Xiao Long's temper rose. It was becoming a rather common occurrence if she thought about it. The human was rather ill-tempered.

"Twenty-five thousand? Don't be insulting!" Xiao Long crossed her arms frowning in exacerbation. "The ship is worth at least eighty."

"This ship is rubbish. Barely worth the scrap," The man she was bartering with countered patiently as though he was speaking to an over-eager child, "The engines are nearly fried. The Fold drive is cooked. Half of the bulkheads have collapsed, the superstructure is falling apart. No, twenty-five is more than reasonable."

Xiao Long was about to start again. Blake knew she had to step in before her companion decided to do something impulsive and drastic.

"You forgot the torpedoes, sir," Blake calmly interrupted before Xiao Long could start, "Certainly they are worth more than the twenty-five you are offering us."

Xiao Long shot her a grateful look but quickly returned to the hanger dealer. "There's four of them in there. You know as well as I do that those alone are worth an easy one-hundred. I'm offering the ship and the torps for eighty. Fair?"

The man sat back for a moment thinking.

"Sixty-five," He offered evenly.

"Seventy," Xiao Long offered, as she leaned on the table.

The man nodded. "Done. I'll make the transfer…"

Xiao Long shook her head. "No, I want hard currency. Aegisalt bars, not E-creds."

The man looked at her, raising an eyebrow. "You're a spacer. E-creds will be fine."

"Aegisalt," Xiao Long insisted again.

Blake watched the two as they stared each other down. Finally, the man relented.

"I'll be right back." He said before turning around back into his shop.

"Easier than I thought it was going to be. Thanks." Xiao Long grinned with a nod.

"E-Creds would have been fine though." Blake's fingers tapped a steady tattoo on the grease stained counter. She was becoming aggravated. The argument and the haggling had taken up valuable time. Every moment spent here was a moment the White Fang spent building their forces. A moment where Cinder could continue to weave her dark magics, gathering the Grimm to her.

"Nah," Yang waved her off, "No smuggler out in Wild Space will take E-creds. They're virtually worthless out here."

Blake nodded. "So our scrap dealer here was trying to cheat us."

Xiao Long shrugged. "Not necessarily, but I wouldn't put it past the bastard."

It was just then the man returned and placed a dozen or so milky white and purple streaked card-sized bars on the counter. Xiao Long quickly scooped them up, and after a moment of counting, slipped them into a pouch at her side.

"Pleasure doing business with you." Xiao Long waved once she was satisfied with the payment.

The man grunted something that not even Blake's superior hearing could detect before he turned away yelling at his workers to go and collect the ship.

"Well, that's part one done," Xiao Long grunted as she walked down the street, weaving through the small groups of people clustered around stalls selling everything from weapons to intoxicants to scraps of strange foul smelling meats. "Now to find us a ship."

"And where will we find that?" Blake raised an eyebrow as she followed after her. Side stepping the odd solitary pickpocket and dodging around an overly aggressive merchant hawking Grimm repellent charms made from what Blake could only guess; were human bones tied together with leather strips.

Xiao Long turned and winked. "At the nearest drinking hole, Blakey."

Inwardly Blake seethed as she struggled to maintain an air of aloofness. Xiao Long had been told again and again, over several days, not just by her, but by her sister and the Atlassian as well. It was obvious the pirate was just trying to get under her skin.

"Well… This looks like a good place to start as any." Xiao Long ignoring her seething companion and pushed her way inside and into the dark entrance of the bar, as Blake, still seething with annoyance, followed close behind.

* * *

Jaune Arc, smuggler and Captain of the _Juniper_ checked his cards again, then placed a small Aegisalt bar in front of himself buying another card before tossing a larger tablet from his stack into the middle pile. His long, scraggly blond hair and bright blue eyes made his wide smile seem boyish and charmingly disarming, as he passed his turn with a wave.

Beside him, his co-pilot, first mate and ship's cook, Lie Ren, was almost the complete opposite. Where Jaune was blond and open: grinning and laughing, Ren was black-haired, stoic and emotionless. His only movements were to purchase a card himself and to toss in a matching bet; indicating an end to his phase.

Jaune nodded as two of their opponents tossed their cards away in disgust, while another eyed him suspiciously.

"No hard feelings then, Jaune?" Perry, the man who sat across from him, asked lightly.

Jaune leaned back into his seat nonchalantly. "If I had a problem with everyone who tried to blow the _Juniper _out of the sky I wouldn't have a whole lot of business partners left. It's the way of the game sometimes isn't it?"

Jaune wasn't much one for holding grudges. It was a simple truth that came with the business. Sometimes your employer was your best friend. Other times they would try and shoot you in the back. All you could do was deal with it.

Take Perry as an example. Just the other day he had tried to down the _Juniper_ as it came back from a Mistral run. Perry's ship had gotten the worse from that exchange, but now the two were playing cards in some dingy drinking hole.

To the outsider, this was a strange turn of events. For Jaune and the crew of the _Juniper_, this was simply a part of life as a smuggler in Wild Space

Perry gwaffed a short laugh. "You shorted the Spiders. They're pissed, and their reach is long outside of Mistral."

"Well, it's not like they were trying to short me. We had an agreement, they failed to live up to it. So I sold off the cargo which they didn't pay for." Jaune's fingers tapped the back of his cards before he looked back down at them. Waiting patiently for Perry to reveal his own hand.

"You sold their cargo to the Tiandihui," Perry commented idly as he laid down his cards. "Queen's Right Chalice."

"No, I sold the cargo they failed to purchase to the Tiandihui," Jaune corrected raising a finger, as he turned his own cards over. "King's Golden Sword."

The man laughed again as Jaune scooped up the pot and tossed several bars of Aegisalt to Ren who had been cleaned out over the past hour or so.

"Well then. I'll be seeing you around Jaune," Perry grinned as he stood up and walked out of the bar, the two others from his crew following behind him.

"He's going to be back," Ren warned.

Jaune nodded as he lit a Lhostick and took a drag. "Probably."

"Want me to get the ship ready?"

Jaune sat quietly for a moment. "We were shorted for our last run, yes?"

Ren closed his eyes, a habit he developed when number crunching, and nodded. "Compared to last month? We're down roughly forty percent. Getting shorted by the Spiders didn't help much."

"No it didn't… There's a lot of money to be made here, so I don't think we'll be leaving just yet. Besides we have Pyrrha." Jaune tapped his lho out with a small, fond grin. "She's worth an easy hundred mercs. We'll be fine."

Ren was about to reply when two women, surprisingly both Faunus, walked straight up to their table.

"You Jaune Arc? Captain of the _Juniper_?" The blonde Faunus asked. She was smaller than Jaune in height, but the well-defined muscles on her arms made her tough and strong looking. Her smile revealed sharp fang like canines and her pupils were slits.

"I am," Jaune answered, not overly concerned. From the corner of his eye, he saw Ren's arm move subtly to pull his pistol from his holster.

"Great!" The blonde dropped into the chair across from him. "I'm Yang, this is Bla… Belladonna. We're looking to book a ship."

"Lucky for you the _Juniper _is available for hire." Jaune straightened his shoulders and back, folding his hands in front of him in an effort to appear professional. "What's the cargo?"

The other Faunus, Belladonna, a cat by her ears, shook her head as she too sat down. "No cargo. Just passengers. Four of us all together."

"All Faunus?"

"Just the one. Me. is that a problem?" Belladonna asked with a note of hostility in her voice.

Jaune shook his head. "No, just wanting to know if we have to make climate and accommodation adjustments."

Belladonna slowly eased back into her seat.

"So where are you going? Is there a time frame?" Ren took his cue and leaned forward. "Anything we need to avoid?"

Yang smiled and leaned forward, pushing her… assets out in a very provocative manner. Jaune gulped and snapped his eyes to her, refusing to look down.

"You see Captain Arc," Yang's voice took on a husky, breathy tone. "We have two stops to make. The first is out to the edge of Grimm Space. Then we are going to be returning to Atlas."

"Grimm Space?" Thankfully Ren was less distracted by the display. "Why would you need to go there? That's suicide."

"Oh, we don't need to go into Grimm Space. Just near the edge," Belladonna answered back cooly, ignoring her companion's display. "You see, we were hired to bring an Atlassian academic to the edge of Grimm Space. She wishes to collect several specimens to study the evolution of Grimm who haven't come into contact with intelligent life."

"I see," Jaune said, not daring to remove his eyes from Yang's. "Well then… Let's talk price."

He turned to Ren who quickly wrote a number down and pushed it over to the two ladies.

"Thirty thousand!" Yang was astounded. "I could buy a ship for that."

"You could buy a piece of junk. The _Juniper_ is the fastest ship this side of Wild Space." Ren steepled his fingers together as he peered over them at the two. "Plus we are then headed almost half-way across the galaxy from Grimm Space to the core world of the Protectorate. Thirty-thousand includes our refueling costs, as well as danger pay."

"We could go to any other pilot and get a much better deal." Belladonna argued back. "All who could make the same 'fastest ship' claim."

Yang nodded in agreement with her compatriot. "What she said. Fifteen."

Ren bowed his head as though agreeing with their assessment. "Indeed. They can all make that claim. The _Juniper_, however, simply is the fastest ship in Wild Space. Or else you wouldn't have come to us. Thirty thousand is reasonable."

Yang snorted. "We both know it isn't. Twenty-thousand."

Jaune knew that twenty-thousand was an insult. No pilot or Captain would accept the job under twenty-five. Yet... There was something about these two ladies. The way they held themselves, the way their eyes kept flickering between him and Ren, the windows, the doors, and the other patrons. That interested him; there was something more and though he had very little interest in heroics. Adventure, well… adventure was something quite different. Jaune, for some reason, knew he wanted this job.

Besides, these women, it seemed like they needed help. Jaune Arc, despite cynicism that had come to colour his views on the galaxy, would never turn away someone in need. That just wasn't him.

Before Ren could open his mouth, Jaune cut him off. "Twenty-three. Up front. In Aegisalt."

Both Yang and Belladonna sat back in surprise. Yang was the first to recover.

"Deal," she said, holding out her hand, which Jaune took.

There was a dull klink as several bars of Aegisalt dropped from Yang's hand onto the table. Ren quickly scooped them up but spent several seconds examining each one carefully, checking for marks and purity before giving Jaune a nod.

"Well, you got yourselves a ship. Hanger Thirty-Two A whenever you're ready." Jaune stood up and motioned with his head "Come on Ren, let's get the ship ready."

* * *

**A/N** And so Jaune makes his appearance. Where Jaune is Pyrrha Nikos is never far behind. Hope you enjoyed this!


	5. The Juniper

**Chapter Five:**_ The Juniper_

Yang ducked underneath a wild, drunken hook A man who was reminiscent of a bellowing mass of fat, grease and body hair staggered forward, off-balance. She took advantage of the man's lack of balance and landed two solid kidney blows, before smashing his jaw with a powerful left hook, dropping the man like a side of beef cut from a butcher's hook.

Yang barely had time to admire her work, when a heeled boot, belonging to one Belladonna Zech Blake Ist Dawn's Hope, connected with the side of her head. She was sent sprawling across the liquor-stained and chair-scratched floor.

_Keep your head up, don't drop your guard like a damn amateur. This isn't your first bar room ball._ She used the momentum from the kick to roll to her feet. She shot Belladonna a scowl as she turned and spat blood.

All Yang wanted was a drink, and after knocking that Arc guy down to twenty-three thousand she had Void damned deserved it. But Little Miss Belladonna had to get pissy after Yang called her Blakey that last time. She just had to throw her drink. She just had to hit that group of pirates.

Yep. This was all the cat's fucking fault.

Yang ducked underneath another kick from Belladonna, then threw a couple of quick jabs; more to create space for Yang to think and get a feel for her opponent than to actually try to connect with the cat.

Belladonna dodged the two half-hearted punches, quickly ducking a good six or seven paces back. _So that's how you play huh? Attack, avoid the counter, retreat. Rinse and repeat eh? _Yang slammed her fist together in eager anticipation.

Yang had to admire the grace and agility with which Belladonna danced through the mess of bodies before she leapt onto a table and used it as a springboard to launch another kick at Yang's head.

_But… _Yang grinned in savage triumph as she caught Belladonna's leg and threw her across the bar, _you ain't beating me in strength._

Belladonna hit the floor in a thud but quickly leapt to her feet, only to be set upon by another group of angry, howling patrons.

"Well I guess cats don't always land on their feet," Yang quipped, chuckling to herself.

Yang cursed as she ducked beneath an outstretched arm and wrapped her own across the burly, unkempt man's chest and over his shoulders. With a grunt of effort, Yang lifted the man up and slammed her victim through an empty table.

Another patron attempted to blindside her with a flying rugby tackle, which she deftly sidestepped. She caught another patron by surprise with her devastating right hook. Yang almost laughed as he was tossed to the beer-stained floor where he spat teeth, barely conscious.

Several more drunk patrons rushed her and Yang was forced to give ground. As she ducked, weaved and dodged angry punches, kicks, the odd bottle, and broken chair leg, she felt her back press up against someone else's.

"Duck!" the person, a woman by her voice, yelled.

Yang didn't hesitate and felt the woosh of air as a weapon of some kind swung over their heads.

Using her shoulder to keep her back to the other woman, Yang spun around, catching a chair leg, and the arm that held it, on the backswing. With a tug, Yang pulled the man off balance and brought her knee into his groin.

The man gasped in pain and his knees buckled as he fell to the floor. Yang followed it up with a quick right straight punch into the nose. She felt a crunch as the man fell over grabbing at his face as he screamed in pain.

"Thanks!" Yang shouted over the screams and the billowing anger of the patrons. She cast a quick look over her shoulder and was surprised to find the long, lush black hair and cat ears of Belladonna.

"Not now," Belladonna grunted, punching a man in the gut, then bringing her heel down in an axe kick on the man's shoulder. "I'll deal with you when I'm not about to get brained by some human pirate."

"Deal!" Yang heartily laughed. This was the most fun she had in age; it had been a long time since she had actually been able to cut loose.

_Who knew a bar fight could be so relaxing,_ Yang mused as she ripped a bottle from another man and smashed it against the side of his jaw before she hurled it into the face of another.

"Belladonna!" Yang yelled as three obviously genetically tailored men, who were more like slabs of muscle on bone, charged into the fray.

The Faunus dodged nimbly away as Yang rushed to meet them. She caught the first one with a powerful uppercut snapping the man's overly muscled neck back, just as Belladonna delivered a sharp kick to the back of the man's legs. The man fell back, and before Yang could admire her work, she was smacked aside by a brutal backhand that threw her to the now sticky floor.

Yang shook her head, as her vision blurred and the room spun as she climbed to her feet, only to be knocked back and into a set of tables as Belladonna was thrown into her.

"And here I was starting to have fun" Yang groaned cheerfully as she picked herself up, offering a hand to Belladonna, who, much to Yang's surprise, took it.

"This is what you do for fun?" Belladonna gasped painfully, taking a position beside her facing the two giants.

"Sometimes. Though usually, I'm the only vat-freak involved." Yang smiled sardonically as she took a step forward. "So... you want the one on the left or right?"

"You can have the one on the right. The left is the one who threw me," Belladonna turned and spat.

As the two remaining muscle heads advanced Yang roared a battle cry and the two charged.

Yang groaned as she felt something poking her in the forehead. Annoyingly and insistently.

"Go away." Yang was tired, and she tried to pull the heavy blanket over her and snuggle back into bed. Only the blanket didn't move… And it was made of squishy flesh, not of various artificial and wool fabrics.

And...there was someone resting their head on her shoulder!?

Yang's eyes snapped open and she looked straight into the face of the annoyed, grizzled face of the barkeep.

Injured patrons laid all about. Most of the chairs, tables, and stools were in various stages between damaged and completely destroyed. Belladonna was resting her head on Yang's shoulder, her cat ears tickling Yang's neck as they flicked and moved. What Yang had thought was a blanket turned out to be one of the unconscious vat-freaks, who had so graciously helped them to destroy what little undamaged furniture had been left.

Yang hung her head, slightly embarrassed as she fished for in her pocket for a bar of Aegisalt. She maybe was a hot-head who got into fights for fun…but she never liked wrecking other people's property if they didn't deserve it.

"This should more than cover it." Yang laughed painfully as her numerous bruises made themselves known; and tossed a milky white and purple bar to the barkeep.

The man grumbled something which Yang couldn't be bothered to decipher and closed her eyes. She needed to sleep.

"Let's… try not to do this again," Belladonna whispered against her shoulder.

"Yeah… not for a while," Yang nodded in agreement, and then paused "Hey Belladonna?"

"...Blake… You can call me Blake."

Yang grinned tiredly as she closed her eyes and slowly drifted back off to sleep. "You fight real good, Blake. Real good."

"You too, Yang."

* * *

Jaune and Ren walked in silence as they weaved their way through the dirty, rubbish-strewn streets. Though Ren was difficult to read at the best of times, Jaune had known the man long enough to know the subtle clues he gave off when something was gnawing at him; a slight tightening of his shoulders, a quick or barely visible frown. If it wasn't for his rotten luck, the man would be a masterful card player.

"Well, what do you think?" Jaune asked, breaking the silence as they entered the crowded bazaar.

"You undersold us by two-thousand," Ren answered, his tone was as quiet and contemplative as it always was. His magenta coloured eyes roamed over the crowd and stalls instead of looking directly at Jaune. "They're not telling us the truth either."

Jaune shrugged as they passed by several stalls, offering various charms and trinkets for protection, cheap and poorly kept weapons, and adulterated intoxicants; which most were highly illegal throughout the more civilized parts of the galaxy.

"When has a client ever told us the truth about what we'll be doing?" Jaune was rather ambivalent; several years as a smuggler had taught him that clients were rarely upfront. He was more concerned with Ren's thoughts on the underselling, especially as the _Juniper_ was still in the red for the past few months.

Ren sighed, which, for him, was as telling a long string of frustrated expletives from anyone else. "Jaune you need to take your responsibilities more seriously. We're in the red for this month, and you and I both know twenty-three is barely going to cover fuel costs."

Jaune smiled lightly as he patted his friend on the shoulder. "We'll manage. We always do. Plus there is a way to reduce our fuel-"

"Roman Torchwick?" Ren interrupted, as he cocked his head.

"Roman," Jaune sheepishly admitted. Ever since their first meeting, Ren didn't have the greatest opinion of the man; Ren and Roman had taken a polite, but obvious dislike for one another. So much so, that the day Ren had anything positive to say about the Crime Lord, Jaune would quit the smuggling life and settle down as a farmer somewhere.

"He still owes me that favour," Jaune added hurriedly, as he noticed Ren's disapproving frown. "Even if we take the loop around Mistral space to the Protectorate, we'll still be able to cut our fuel costs by at least a quarter."

"True," Ren agreed reluctantly, "Doesn't mean I have to like it. You are playing it too close with that man."

"He's the one that helped me get into the business," Jaune countered, "He's never done me wrong."

Ren stayed silent and Jaune let the matter drop. He understood Ren's… suspicion of Torchwick, he understood it very well. Torchwick was a crime lord, running one of the largest criminal enterprises in Protectorate space, whose tendrils reached even into Vale Space. Jaune was not a fan of dishonesty; and honesty was not a trait one would accuse Mr. Roman Torchwick of having. It would be a lie to say the man didn't joyfully embrace dishonesty. But Roman had always been good to Jaune, always paid, never shorted and always lived up to his word once it was given.

He just wished it wasn't brought up every time Jaune mentioned the man.

The two walked in silence for a short time, until Ren turned off the street and towards a run-down stall managed by a wizened old man. A local soothsayer, by the look of him, who was hawking his wares and the promises of protection for voidsmen on shore leave.

"Another trip, another charm," Jaune said as he stepped behind Ren, watching as he picked up brightly painted charms, carved idols, and beaded fetishes in turn. He turned each around in his thin fingers, examining them each with a critical eye.

"They work," Ren replied as he picked up a dark amber coloured one that dangled from a silver chain. A dozen handcrafted metal flowers had been woven into the chain and on each side of the charm was a small bell, which chimed merrily with every movement. A small, satisfied smile crossed Ren's lips.

It was a ritual the two had completed dozens of times since Ren and Nora had joined the crew. The inside of the _Juniper _was now decorated with dozens of idols, talismans, charms, and fetishes each one was supposedly imbued with the power to repel the Grimm.

They've had multiple encounters with the monsters, who were the blight of the galaxy. Jaune remembered pointing that out once to Ren after a particularly close encounter with a small flock of Griffin Grimm out near the border of the Vale frontier and Wild Space.

Ren had simply nodded and then he had looked Jaune straight in the eye and quietly reminded him that, ever since they had been together; and despite their years in the void, sometimes at the very edge of Grimm Space, _Not Once_ had they ever encountered anything bigger than a Nevermore. _Not once_ had they seen anything more dangerous than that small flock of Griffin.

Ren believed in them. He deeply believed in them.

And in the end, that was enough for Jaune, despite his doubts.

Jaune watched the crowd as Ren paid and carefully slipped his new purchase into his bag. The two resumed their walk back to the _Juniper_ now that one of Ren's customary pre-voyage traditions was completed.

"Did you notice we were being watched?" Ren quietly asked under his breath, once they were back out in the main street.

"I did. Over by the alley to our right," Jaune replied with a whisper as he kept his hands relaxed to his side. He knew better than to gesture or look in the indicated direction.

He had seen the bearded man watching them from across the street, noting that he hadn't taken his eyes off of them during the whole transaction. It had been fairly obvious too, which stank of an amateur.

"Then you missed the other two," Ren whispered back, "One was sneaking glances at us from the meat stall that was to the left. There's another we just passed, on the right side of the street. Near that dust-bike."

Jaune smiled fondly; Ren's observation skills were always a source of amazement. "Where would I be without you?"

"Probably dead out in the desert somewhere," Ren noted, the corners of his mouth barely ticking up.

"Thought that was Pyrrha's job," Jaune chuckled darkly, before sobering up, "Think they're Perry's?"

Ren shrugged as the two turned a corner towards Hanger Thirty-Two A. "Possibly. Want to take them now or wait?"

Jaune thought about that for a moment. If the stalkers were Perry's men, then he couldn't have more than eight or nine, including him and his crew. His ship had taken heavy damage from their previous little exchange and he wouldn't be able to afford the extra hands in Jaune's opinion.

However, if on the odd chance these men weren't Perry's, then it was impossible to know how many more might there be. Attacking them would also tip off any survivors, and more importantly, their employer, that the crew of the _Juniper _was on to them.

But on the other hand, remaining idle would give whoever they were the initiative. Worse yet, they might try something with their new passengers aboard. A firefight breaking out would risk one the passengers getting hurt, or even killed. Something like that, taking place while under the care of Jaune and his crew would give that Yang woman a very good reason to demand compensation. Even after Jaune had given her a heavily discounted fee.

He wished he had Pyrrha with them right now. Out of the entire crew, she was by far the best fighter and having her here would allow him to go on the offensive. But she was back on the ship; cities and towns never made her feel comfortable.

"They know where the _Juniper _is. We could have the advantage in the hangar with Nora and Pyrrha. But we would have to give up the initiative," Jaune thought out loud in a low voice, carefully scanning the crowd ahead for any more suspicious actors. "On the other hand, Nora would be rather annoyed if she missed out on a firefight. "

"We wouldn't hear the end of it for a good couple of weeks," Ren quietly agreed with a small nod. "She has been complaining that _Magnhild_ has been getting little use recently."

"I think we're going to have to find out who they are." Jaune finally decided as he came to a stop in front of the door to Hanger Thirty-Two A. "Get Nora and Pyrrha and ...uhh... see if we can't lure one or two out with a piece of bait."

"Let me guess. That bait is going to be you," Ren commented with a raised eyebrow, as he followed his captain through the door.

"Call it my punishment for underselling to the two ladies," Jaune laughed as the door slid shut behind them.

* * *

Ruby sighed irritably as she looked out of the window and over the bazaar, from the small boarding room they had rented, while Belladonna and Yang had gone to sell the ship and purchase passage aboard another. She had wanted to go with them, but Yang had shot her down.

"Someone needs to keep an eye on the Heiress, and she seems to like you the best.," Yang had teased her before she and the Faunus had wandered off into the bazaar.

That had been several hours ago and Ruby was starting to worry. Sure, Yang was tough and that Belladonna woman seemed like she could handle herself.

Still, Yang was her sister. It was Ruby's job to worry.

She had tried to take her mind off the anxiety, eventually stepping out briefly to buy some clothes and to buy both herself and Weiss some lunch. Nothing more than local lizard meat on toasted bread, with a strange purple drink. But after several days of eating nutrient bars and drinking recycled water, it had been among the most delicious meals Ruby had ever eaten.

"What is taking those two so long?" Weiss loudly complained for the nth time. "Surely it doesn't take this long for them to find us a ship. The quicker we can out of this vermin-infested hellhole the better."

Weiss huffed irritability behind her. The room, once again, echoed with the near-ceaseless pacing of her boots against the pitted, hardwood floor.

"I'm sure it's fine," Ruby smiled assuredly over her shoulder, "They probably just stopped to eat or explore the market."

Weiss scoffed but stopped her pacing. Quiet finally fell over the room as Ruby turned to observe the Heir Apparent. Weiss had ditched her dirty, tattered officer's uniform and had dressed in the newly purchased items Ruby had brought, choosing a pair of knee-high boots, a long blue trail coat, which was popular among spacers. Beneath that was a pale, ice blue shirt and trousers; and belted around her waist were her rapier and pistol.

Yet there was still that air of nobility that was draped around Weiss's shoulders like an ermine mantle: the way she held herself, the way she moved, her clipped accent and speaking manner all implied she was far above any lowly ruffian spacer. They would draw unwanted attention, so she was stuck in this hole with Weiss.

Yet despite her nobility, Weiss seemed to be shrinking. Her shoulders hunched, her fingers clenching and unclenching as though she was working the courage to do something that the Heir Apparent was not used to doing.

"Ruby?" Weiss asked after several seconds of silence. Her voice was so soft that Ruby wasn't even sure if she had spoken at all. "I'm… I'm not good at this. Making friends, being part of a team."

"It's okay, Weiss. It's okay," Ruby reassured gently, sitting down next to her and putting her arm around the other girl's shoulder.

"Not it's not." Weiss shook her head. "I shouldn't be like this. I'm the Heir Apparent of the Protectorate. Certain things are… expected. Demanded of me. I'm supposed to be strong. Able to shoulder anything and everything that can be demanded of you; and shoulder it alone."

Ruby shook her head. She couldn't imagine growing up like that. She at least always had her mother and, after she died, her sister and father after Uncle Qrow had smacked him awake. She could have always turned to them when she needed help. And when Yang had left…

Ruby couldn't help but stifle a small sniff and wiped a tear.

"What I am saying…," Weiss hesitated, then stood up and turned to face Ruby, "I'm sorry. I'm not like this. It's just… Old habits. I'll try to do better."

Ruby was quiet for a moment, then leapt up from the bed and pulled Weiss into a tight hug. The other girl gasped and wheezed out a faint, "Please get off of me."

Not that Weiss tried to fight her off, Ruby noted, as she gave the white-haired Heir Apparent one last squeeze before breaking off.

Weiss coughed and straightened out her clothes which had been rumpled in the hug.

"Well now. It's going to be us against the galaxy!" Ruby proclaimed with an eye-dazzling grin, "You, me, Belladonna and Yang against whatever they can throw at us."

Ruby threw a few excited punches into the air, shadow boxing. Out of the corner of her eye, she noticed Weiss finally smiled.

"Ain't nothing that can stop us!" Ruby shouted eagerly.

"Well… Be that as it may, I would feel better if your sister and Belladonna were back with news of a ship that can get us off the planet," Weiss added dryly, providing a bucket of cold water to Ruby's over-enthusiasm.

"Aaaaand guess what we got!" Yang, as though summoned by her name, bellowed as she shoved the door in, waving a data slate in her hand.

"Yang!" Ruby exclaimed, bounding over to her older sister. She came to a skidding halt however when she noticed Yang's puffy eye and purple-yellow bruise covering the side of her face.

"What happened?" Ruby badgered, her voice filled with concern as she rushed to her sister's side, peering at the bruises.

"Bar fight," Belladonna answered calmly as she slid past Yang and into the now crowded room. "Yang here thought it was a good idea to try and take on the whole bar at once."

Yang laughed as she looked over at her. "Only because you threw your drink at them, Blake."

Ruby grimaced and looked over at Belladonna, who had previously been so vocal about Yang's casual informality_._ To her surprise though, Belladonna merely smiled with a roll of her eyes, despite her own bruises.

"So what's the ship, is that it? Let me see, let me see!" Ruby eagerly pointed to the data slate which Yang cheerfully held out of reach.

"Yep," Yang confirmed as Ruby jumped grabbing the slate and burying herself into the glorious details.

Ruby was so engrossed in the schematics of the ship on the registry that she barely paid attention to Yang and the rest.

The ship was a _Pharos_ class long-range freighter; a ship-class used almost exclusively by the Royal Vale Navy. Ruby's eyes went wide; seeing it out here was rather shocking. She looked deeper into the registry furrowing her brow as she flicked through the slate's documents. Some of the systems… most of the systems didn't make sense.

There was no way they could have an SPDC Series 5 Cold Fission Power Core! That wasn't even available on the civilian market! There would be massive power overdraw, even if they did have the Han-B280 Sublight engines. The registry crazily claimed that the _Juniper _was capable of a one-point-five Fold! That put it as fast as any frigate in any fleet! A freighter, even a naval one should be torn apart at those speeds. She shuddered at the thought of the levels of stress such a Fold would put on the poor ship's superstructure.

"...We managed to get him down to twenty-three once I showed him a bit of the girls," Yang was boasting as she took a seat on the table, scooping up the last little bit of lizard on toast.

"Yang…" Ruby called out as she waved the data slate, "are you sure this is right?"

Yang shrugged, popping the last little bit of toast into her mouth. "It's what I got from the registry. Though considering the planet we're on… who knows."

Ruby shook her head. "This can't be right. They are saying they have a power core that only the Protectorate military has access to, a Fold drove capable of one-point-five and guns that should be mounted on a destroyer."

"What are you saying then, Rose? That they're lying?" Belladonna asked curiously from where she leaned against the wall.

"If I was to take a guess… I would say most likely," Ruby acknowledged, tossing the slate onto the table next to the platter.

"Great," Weiss fumed as she crossed her arms in a huff, "So we just hired a ship that most likely is overstating its capabilities."

"Ah, you are worrying too much Weiss. That's why you got me and Blake. If it turns out this guy is a complete and total scumbag, I'm sure that we can drop him and take the ship. No sweat" Yang bragged as she flexed her muscle.

Ruby frowned.

She was getting a bad feeling about all of this.

* * *

Jaune stretched in the evening air of the hangar. The passengers hadn't shown up yet, and the _Juniper_ was ready to go when they did. Nora had finished the pre-flight maintenance over an hour ago and Ren had called it a night with the pre-flight checks.

Which meant there was only one…well, two more things for them to do.

Get another bottle for the celebratory drink of a job well done and hopefully lure Perry, or whoever it was who had been following him into a trap.

The streets were mostly quiet now. Most of the merchants either had or were still in the process of packing up their wares before they shuffled off to whatever hovel they called home.

However, Jaune still kept his rifle, _Crocea Mors,_ slung across his back. It was never a good idea to go anywhere on Caviis IV without some sort of protection. Doubly so if one was hoping to ambush a group of paid killers working for some pirate gang or crime family.

Jaune whistled a light tune he had picked up in the Royal Valian Academy, as he followed the winding street back down to the bar where he had met his newest customers. His boots kicking up stray clouds of red dust.

It was a quiet night. A calm night.

Despite knowing it would be a trap, despite knowing that there were some people after him, Jaune was still caught completely off guard when two rounds slammed into his chest, knocking the wind out of him and tossing him the ground in a painful heap.

_And that was the second thing you should never go without. _Jaune thought bitterly as he coughed painfully. _A good solid piece of armour._

He pulled his jacket open. His white ceramic and micro-woven nerosteel layered breastplate looked to still be intact. Which was great… even if it still hurt like Hell.

Boots crunched against the ground as dark, shadowy figures, a half-dozen of them, burst from cover in the dark alleyways covering him with various guns and rifles.

"Well, well, well. What do we have here." A man rasped, his voice grating like sandpaper on ancient gnarled bark. "Jaune… Didn't expect you to be out this late."

Jaune groaned.

It wasn't Perry.

He flopped back down and closed his eyes. Well, that was just great.

"Dex…," Jaune gasped as he tried to get up, "Got to say wasn't expecting you."

Dex chuckled through smoke-stained teeth as he stepped into the dim light of a barely lit street lamp. "There's a few, well, actually more than a few, individuals out looking for you, Jaune. I just happened to be the lucky bastard who found you first."

Jaune cursed under his breath. One or two dirt suckers he was prepared to deal with. Three, he was pretty sure they could handle. But if there were more than that after him, then he and his crew were in a lot of danger.

Not that he already wasn't in a lot of danger, considering the circumstances.

Dex took a few steps forward, drawing his pistol and dropping his knee onto Jaune's chest.

"Look Dex…. You can tell the Clan I can get their money…," he coughed out through a beggar's grin.

Dex waved a finger in his face. "Nah Jaune. The Clan don't care about that anymore. You see, time's up. You promised them a payment, you missed it. For the last three months. They want your head."

Dex brought his pistol up and laid the muzzle against Jaune's forehead.

"Sorry Jaune," he apologized without actually sounding sorry at all, "It's nothing personal. Just business."

Jaune couldn't help but chuckle. "I've been hearing that a lot lately."

Just then there was a crack of a rifle and Dex's head snapped back with a spray of blood and bone. His gang stood there, stunned as another two shots rang out, dropping two more in less than a second.

A figure jumped the roof and landed in a neat crouch rifle raised right in front of Jaune. Her long red hair fell elegantly around her shoulders; her bronze coloured armour gleamed in the dim light. Her rifle cracked again, dropping another one of Jaune's would-be killers.

The rest scattered, leaping to cover while firing wildly. Jaune scrambled to his hands and knees and threw himself behind a merchant stall. His rescuer leapt to her feet and seemed to almost glide across the ground.

She was fast. Graceful.

Deadly.

Though Jaune had seen her in action a hundred times before, he knew that even if he could live to see it a thousand times, a million times, a million million times, he would still be awestruck by the sheer, deadly, inhuman grace, of Pyrrha Nikos.

She was among the band of would-be-killers before they had even reached cover, her rifle mag-locked to her back, her xiphos style sword in her hands. She brought it up in a quick stroke, slicing easily through a man's chest, before stabbing into one of his companion's sternum.

Grabbing the dying man, Pyrrha pulled him in front of her, as another one of Jaune's attackers fired off several shots from his pistol. Jaune could hear the thump of bullets hitting her human shield before she threw him off her sword and charged.

She was on him before he had a chance to react, her blood-stained blade slicing through his raised arm, as he attempted to ward off the blow. It fell to the ground, his hand still gripped the pistol, his stump sprayed the ground with blood. With a quick flick of her wrist and a short spin to face her last opponent, Pyrrha casually decapitated the man.

The last surviving member of the gang had already run away, after he had tossed his weapon to the ground to escape the carnage.

Jaune gave a relieved smile as he stumbled to his feet, his hand still covering his chest where he had been shot. Slowly he bent over to pick _Crocea Mors _from where it had fallen from his back.

"Jaune," Pyrrha smiled fondly with a nod of greeting.

"Thanks for the help." Jaune looked around with a raised eyebrow. "Where's Nora and Ren? Thought they were going to help."

"Guarding the ship," Pyrrha answered, sitting him back down and started to check his chest to make sure his ribs hadn't broken where he had been shot. "Thought there might have been a chance of them coming after it, so I had them stay behind."

Jaune panted painfully as she stripped off his armor. "I'm hoping that's going to be the only one."

"Doubtful," Pyrrha said evenly despite the look of worry in her bright emerald eyes. "They said you've missed the Clans payments."

Jaune muttered another curse. This was the last thing he needed. He didn't need his crew to worry. But now that was kind of out of the bag.

"Just the last couple of months," he admitted after a moment of awkward silence, "We've been in the red for a bit…."

"Why didn't you tell us?" Pyrrha's tone was gentle and filled with concern, as she helped Jaune back to his feet and threw his arm over her shoulder to support his weight. "We've known about the money troubles, but why not tell us about the gangs wanting to collect?"

"It's my job. You shouldn't have to pick up the slack," Jaune insisted as the two slowly made their way back towards the _Juniper_.

"We're your friends, not just your crew," Pyrrha chided lightly, "We can help you know."

"I'll figure something out." Jaune deflected lamely, "Maybe after this job, we can quit Wild Space. Go join a mercenary band, or sell our services on the Frontier."

"We would still have the syndicates and gangs coming after us. If I'm not wrong in guessing it's not just the Clan we owe money to."

Jaune winced. How she always managed to see right through him? It was uncanny.

"No…" he admitted, lowering his head, "The Spiders want us dead, but that's because they shorted us, so I sold off the remainder of their cargo to Tiandihui. The Clan… well… I promised the Clan a thirty percent return on investment on that Protectorate Run."

"You mean that one where we were almost blown out of space and lost the cargo?" Pyrrha questioned as they rounded a corner.

"Yeah… that one." Jaune remembered bitterly, "I told them I would pay back their investment plus ten percent… but it seems like they were getting impatient."

"There are more, aren't there?" Pyrrha continued to probe with a soft voice; Jaune could tell she wasn't mad but there was a certain amount of disappointment at his own stubborn refusal to inform Nora, Ren and her.

"Yeah," Jaune admitted sheepishly. "The Mercaricus Guild for the repairs last month. The Go-Land Syndicate for hijacking those weapon shipments three months ago…"

As he named off various syndicates and crime families, Jaune was slowly coming to the realisation that the _Juniper_ had overstayed their welcome. They were bleeding money and owed quite a bit to the various gangs, pirates, and syndicates that called Caviis IV home.

"Fuck, I've really messed this up."

"Yes. You have." Pyrrha agreed with a slight smile, as she used her free arm to punch in the code to Hangar Thirty-Two A. "But we're all still together. All of us, you, me, Nora and Ren. We'll figure something out after this job."

"Thanks, Pyrrha." Jaune smiled tiredly as they climbed up the boarding ramp to the _Juniper_. "Again… What would I do without you?"

* * *

The _Juniper_ was like no other ship that Weiss had ever seen. And she didn't mean that in a good way.

The …_thing_ that sat in Hangar Thirty-Two A was a Frankenstein-like monstrosity of various parts, subsystems and wielded on armour plating. It was squat, long and probably the ugliest ship that she had ever seen.

"Good morning ladies," a rather tall and thin towheaded man, called out, as he walked down the boarding ramp. He wore a short white and yellow coat, an armoured breastplate, boots, and dust-coloured trousers and it made him appear like he was some cast-off from a poor frontier paramilitary.

"May I introduce you to the _Juniper_!" He knocked on the plating. "Fastest tin can in the galaxy." The man grinned proudly before he bowed at the waist. "My name is Jaune Arc - your Captain for the voyage."

"We remember," Yang said, holding out her hand, which Captain took. "My name is Yang, the cat Faunus is Belladonna Zech Blake Ist Dawn's Hope, the one in red is my little sister Ruby and last but not least is Ms. Snow, the academic who we are escorting."

Weiss couldn't help herself as she shook her head at the ship. "It's a piece of junk."

Captain Arc was about to reply when a sharp and angry "HEY!" cut him off.

A short woman with bright red-hair, welders goggles, and a light blue and pink leather jacket lept from the top of the trash heap that these people generously called a ship. She landed with a heavy thud that was well beyond anything someone of her size and weight should have been able to create.

"This ship is the best and greatest ship to ever ship!" The woman shouted as she marched up to the four, fists on her hips, a thunderous scowl on her face. "And she has sensitive feelings too! You need to apologize to her!"

Weiss was taken aback by the diminutive woman who thundered across the hangar to scold them. Weiss could feel Yang tensing up beside her in order to intercept the angry woman just in case she became a threat.

"Nora, Nora!" Captain Arc intercepted the woman before Yang was forced to defend Weiss. "She didn't mean it. She just doesn't know the _Juniper. _I'm sure once she sees what she can do she'll take it back."

Weiss struggled not to roll her eyes. If the hunk of metal junk didn't fall apart on take-off she would be surprised.

The Captain rubbed the back of his neck nervously as he introduced them. "Ladies, this is my chief engineer, Nora Valkyrie."

The woman, as though having already forgotten her outburst, smiled and waved, before, much to Weiss's surprise, she began grilling them on all sorts of personal matters that no well-bred Protectorate lordling would ever reveal in polite conversation.

"Captain…," Weiss began.

He waved her off with a fond smile. "It's how she assigns quarters."

The woman, Nora, shot him a glare. "It's a precise calculation on which quarters they should get to ensure that we are cursed with as little bad luck as humanly possible, Cap'n. Now then! You with the white hair! What did you eat this morning? What's your shoe size? What time and where were you born?"

Weiss found herself too dumbstruck to not answer.

After this brief and rapid interrogation, Weiss found that she had been assigned quarters on the starboard side with Ruby, while Blake and Yang had been given their own quarters port and aft. All according to this girl's 'logical calculations.'

The inside of the _Juniper_ was as chaotic as the outside, various charms, fetishes, talismans, and idols decorated the hallways and whatever shelving space was available. Some were intricate and delicately made, woven with thin wire and precious stones. Others were simply crude carvings from wood, stone, and bone. Some of the walls were brightly painted, some had weird shapes and bizarre patterns, while others were more traditional in their scenes.

The common area slash dining hall was comfortable and roomy. A homemade rag rug was laid out in the centre, made from white fabric and decorated with a pair of yellow crescents. It felt lived in and homey, so different than the hard and barren ships of the Protectorate.

Ruby was having the time of her life. She ran from room to room, squealing with delight, her previous apprehension all but forgotten as she fired off rapid questions to the Engineer, who fired back answers almost as rapidly. Even more strangely, Ms. Valkyrie didn't seem to mind the strange aura that hung around Ruby. If anything, save for the briefest moment when Ruby had been first introduced to her, Ms. Valkyrie seemed not to feel it at all.

Which made Weiss feel terrible. She had given Ruby this big speech about how she would try to be a better person. Weiss did have to admit that as she and Ruby grew closer together as friends, that aura seemed to dissipate. But to see Nora accept her so readily… Was she that judgemental? That prejudice?

The thoughts continued to eat at Weiss even after the brief tour.

Captain Arc took them to the cockpit introduced them to his first mate and copilot: a quiet and stoic man, with magenta eyes and long black hair by the name of Lie Ren.

Everything seemed to be going well for once.

That was until they met the last of the crew.

Weiss felt her breath catch in her throat. She was awestruck.

It was the only word she could think of. The woman was beautiful, graceful. Every step was measured and every stride was artfully placed. Yet… there was more to it. Weiss almost felt peaceful, safe, protected, like she was in the presence of a goddess-given flesh.

Then the woman caught sight of Ruby…

And she fell to the floor, clutching at her head as she screamed in gut-wrenching pain. A second later she heaved and blood spewed from her mouth, landing in a dark crimson pool.

* * *

**A/N: **Pyrrha and Nora have entered the fray! I hope I do them justice. But what is this? What has happened to Pyrrha? Well, you will have to read to find out.


	6. The Grimm

**Chapter Six:**_ The Grimm_

The cockpit of the _Juniper _was quiet—crowded, but quiet. Jaune sat uneasily in the captain's chair, a frown forming, his fingers flexing worriedly as he adjusted the ship's trajectory as the _Juniper_ left the red dust of Caviis IV behind them. Next to him was Ren, quietly contemplative, but fidgety, his arms tight, shoulders hunched as he checked local readouts and sensor sweeps. Nora sat in her traditional spot behind him, shockingly quiet as she held Pyrrha's hand.

Normally the cockpit would be filled with Nora's numerous questions, statements, and dozens of misremembered stories, which Ren would quietly correct when she paused for breath. Currently, her boundless energy seemed sapped and drained as she comforted Pyrrha.

If Jaune was a superstitious man, he would have taken a reserved Nora as an ill omen. He was more than sure that Ren already had, judging by the slight movements as Ren's jaw worked the words of a silent void shanty.

Behind Jaune, Pyrrha sat with her head bowed, her free hand rubbing at her temple, every once in a while, she reached out to grasp the only trinket in the cockpit. It was a strange little thing. A necklace made from polished white beads, which Jaune swore were made of some unknown bone, and a single round charm of a circumpunct etched in gold relief. It was the only mark the _Juniper_ bore from their mysterious compatriot, that marked the ship as Pyrrha's home. Ren had his trinkets, charms, and fetishes. Nora had painted one or several of the rooms with bizarre, colourful shapes in strange, sometimes unnerving patterns. Even Jaune had knitted the rug in the mess and common room.

All Pyrrha had added was her necklace in the cockpit.

Every now and then she would reach out for it, bringing its bronze relief to her forehead, before letting it go to hang from the ceiling once again in the middle of the four.

Before them was the vast openness of space. Distant stars shined like tiny candle flames off in the distance against the cold hard black of the void.

It was a view which Jaune never stopped finding awe-inspiring. Despite him not being much of a believer, Jaune could always see why some still clung to those beliefs every time he looked out the viewing port. But the stars were dull today, overshadowed by worry. Pyrrha screamed as he had never heard from anyone before…

Then she vomited up blood.

Their passengers had disappeared to Ms. Snow's quarters, where they remained held up. Pyrrha had slowly recovered after that; her cheeks, while still pale, were returning to a healthy hue. Though she still winced at the bright, sterile lights of the _Juniper_'s halls and so had kept her eyes closed.

"Pyrrha… What happened?" Jaune asked gently as he turned his high backed seat to look his friend in the eye.

Pyrrha opened a single emerald eye and tried to smile. Instead, she grimaced, the skin around her eyes and mouth tight. "It's fine Jaune. Just a… just a migraine."

"That was more than a migraine." Nora was quiet, still clutching Pyrrha's hand squeezing it reassuringly. "You took one look at that Ruby girl and suddenly you're screaming! What happened? What did she do? Do I have to break her legs? I don't want to, I like her! But if she's hurting you…"

"Magic. Ill omens." Ren nodded sagely, not taking his eyes from the ship's instruments.

"No, no. Nothing like that," Pyrrha laughed, though Jaune could hear that it was tinged with pain, "The girl… she's fine. I'm fine."

Jaune sighed as he leaned back his chair creaking at the movement. He owed his life to her a dozen, a hundred times over. He had shared with her countless intimate thoughts and even some of his fears. She was his friend. But that being said, he actually knew very little about Pyrrha. He didn't know where she was from, who her parents were, where she had learned to fight. Pyrrha Nikos was an enigma, a secret.

One that he was not privy to, despite their years together.

"Pyrrha? Please…" Jaune was insistent, his tone cracking ever so slightly. Never once had he seen Pyrrha taken down, so to see her screaming in pain…

"I'm fine. I'm okay." Pyrrha's jaw was set, her tone resolute; she even pulled free her hand which Nora had clung so tightly to. Brusquely, she said, "What's our course?"

Jaune wanted to protest the blatant drop and change in subject, but, sadly, he knew better. Once Pyrrha had set her mind to something, there was very little chance of changing.

Ren said nothing, though his shoulders had become tight and the slightest hint of frown forming at the edges of lips clearly displayed how he felt about how the conversation had turned. Frankly, Jaune agreed with him,.

Ren brought up the holographic map from his display console. The trip would be simple enough. One of Ms. Snow's Faunus companions, Belladonna, he believed, had given them the coordinates for an unnamed planet right near the edge of Grimm Space. The route itself was also fairly trivial: a slight rounding path, using several planets and systems as bearings and markers. All told, a week or two from Caviis IV to the first destination.

Getting back to Atlas, on the other hand, was going to be a little bit more difficult. A direct route would not only lead them through the Go-Land Syndicate shipping lanes but also near the area of space where the Pirate Queen and the _Muninn_ had claimed their hunting grounds.

Jaune was of the opinion that avoiding the fight was far more preferable than getting caught in a slugging match with either of them. Yes the _Juniper _was fast and carried more firepower than what most ships her size had a right to. But there was always that chance of something going wrong. Better to avoid them and live to spend the reward, then die in a ventilated, drifting wreck.

So the plan was to go far around, hugging the outskirts of Wild Space before making their turn towards Atlas. It would take more time, stretching it to three or four weeks for the Atlas run, but it was safer.

Pyrrha nodded and stood up as Jaune finished, her normally placid expression... thoughtful? Worried? Concerned? Maybe all three blended into one.

"Excellent." Pyrrha smiled, "I will inform our passengers of the route and time table then."

"Maybe we should let Ren or myself talk to them?" Jaune protested hesitantly, "considering what just happened."

"Jaune." Pyrrha's tone was firm and sharp. "I'm fine. Let me do this."

Not even waiting for an answer, Pyrrha grabbed the data slate and hurried out of the cockpit, leaving the rest of them alone.

Jaune frowned as he chewed his bottom lip. He had never seen Pyrrha like this. Never once in a firefight, or in a ship engagement or even the odd time the _Juniper_ attracted the attention of the Grimm. To see someone who was always so calm in the face of danger, now becoming agitated at simple questions…

Nora quickly wiped her teal coloured eyes with the back of her hand. Pyrrha was her sister in everything but name. To have Pyrrha pull away from her like that would have cut her deep.

Jaune closed his eyes and pinched the bridge of his nose. He was sure Pyrrha would come back and apologise. Nora was too nice; she would instantly forgive Pyrrha, he was certain of that.

But the problem would remain: Pyrrha and her secrets.

"Don't," Ren warned as he punched in the coordinates for the first fold, his face inexpressive as it always was.

"What?" Jaune asked surprised.

"Don't," Ren repeated, "Pyrrha has her secrets. She'll tell us when she thinks the time is right. Pushing the matter won't help."

"Yeah…." Jaune sighed as he turned back towards the viewing screens. Ren was right: Pyrrha had her secrets. When she was ready she would tell them.

In front of him, the stars blurred and the _Juniper_ lurched forward into the void.

* * *

"What did you do to that girl!?" Weiss interrogated as she rounded on Ruby.

"I don't know! I told you, I didn't do anything," Ruby cried, even as she shrank from Weiss cold anger.

Ruby didn't know. She honestly didn't know. Ruby had been so excited to meet someone like Nora who loved ships almost as much as she did and more importantly, Nora didn't recoil when they talked. It was as though to her, Ruby was just a normal girl.

Then the Pyrrha woman showed up. Ruby had been prepared for the usual look of disgust, the shudder of someone being offered something vile. She hadn't been prepared for was watching the woman scream in pain and then vomit blood onto the deck.

Weiss, Belladonna, and Yang had quickly taken her away to the quarters she and Weiss were sharing, and then questioned her for the past hour, thankfully uninterrupted by the _Juniper_'s crew. Ruby lowered her eyes in shame and worry. Hopefully, they wouldn't throw them out.

"Ruby, you're not in trouble… But that woman took one look at you and started screaming as though someone sawed her limb off." Yang sat on the bed beside Ruby and wrapped her arm around her sister's shoulder. Her tone kind and gentle, "We just need to know in case they have questions."

"I know Yang," Ruby whispered as she laid her head against Yang's shoulder. "I know… I just don't know what happened. She took a look at me and then…"

Ruby shrugged.

"We'll be lucky if they don't throw us out the airlock after this," Weiss muttered as she leaned up against the nauseatingly colourful wall.

Ruby hung her head. Had she cost them the galaxy? She tensed when she felt another hand slowly rub her back and the cot she sat on sag with the weight of another person sitting down.

"I'm sorry. It will be okay Ruby," Weiss whispered softly, "We'll think of something."

"I doubt they're going to throw us off," Belladonna added from where she sat at the desk across the room, her face thoughtful. "We've been on board for over an hour and I can hear the Fold drive kicking in. I don't think these are the type of people to send us for a bit of a void walk."

"Yeah, besides we could kick their asses if they tried." Ruby could hear Yang's smirk and feel the muscle in her arm around her shoulders tighten at the thought of a fight.

"I don't think we are going to have to go that far, Yang," Weiss responded.

"But it might come to that," Belladonna warned as she stood up from the chair. "We should be prepared for that possibility."

"I really don't want to fight them," Ruby mumbled as she lifted her head from Yang's shoulder. "Nora's nice and the other's were pretty welcoming too… for smugglers."

"We might have to. We have a mission. If we fail, then billions die." Belladonna marched across the room to look Ruby in the eyes with a hardened glare. "What's four smugglers and nine brothers and sisters compared to a billion."

Ruby winced at the bitterness in her tone. It hurt, but Belladonna was right. If they were forced to, the four of them would have to take the ship from the crew.

A knock at the door interrupted Ruby's gloomy thoughts and the four looked at each other apprehensively. Yang pulled her pistol, taking a position beside the door. Belladonna followed her lead on the other side, readying her heavy boarding blade and light calibre pistol. Weiss checked that her pistol was clear in its holster as Ruby stood up and walked to the door.

The door slid open with a hiss and Ruby blinked in surprise as the blood-red haired woman who had been only recently screaming in pain and throwing up blood stood outside with an too calm and gentle smile.

"Hello again," She greeted Ruby warmly.

"Uh…" Ruby stuttered then caught herself, "I'm sorry. Hello… umm... I don't think we were introduced? 'Cause… well…"

The woman shook her head politely. "No, we weren't and I'm sorry for that. I… took ill I'm afraid."

"It looked a little more than 'ill'," Yang said dryly as she holstered her pistol and joined them at the door. "It looked like you were about to die. Sounded like it too."

The woman's practiced smile never faltered. "I'm sorry if it caused distress, which is why I'm here: to show that no harm was done and to deliver the itinerary from the captain."

The woman offered a data slate, which Yang took with a nod of thanks and quickly skimmed through.

"And… I'm sorry I almost forgot." The woman smiled again and held out her hand, "I'm Pyrrha Nikos. I handle security on the ship."

Ruby took the hand and was surprised by how warm it was and the strength of her grip. A strange feeling of peace and safety seemed to radiate off of this strange woman. The aura of serenity, of peace, of warmth and safety was such an antithesis to Ruby's own...it was almost disquieting.

Ruby hestinently offered her own smile in return. "Thank you Ms. Nikos. I'm Ruby Rose. That's my sister Yang. The Faunus is Belladonna Zech Blake ist Dawn's Hope and of course Ms. Weiss Snow."

Pyrrha softly nodded her head in greeting, her lips tightening just ever so slightly as she quickly let go and tucked her hand behind her back. "A pleasure. As security, I must also inform you of the rules. Feel free to make use of the common area. The ship's cockpit, engines, the armoury, and the weapon bay are off-limits unless accompanied by one of the crew. Feel free to keep your weapons, as I doubt you will be willing to turn them over."

"Damn right we aren't," Yang muttered under her breath.

Whether or not Ms. Nikos had heard her, Ruby was unsure, as the crimson-haired woman continued.

"I must insist you keep them in your quarters. Taking them outside your rooms will be seen as a hostile action. I'm sorry but you must understand that these are simple precautions."

Ruby nodded her head, waving a hand to shush Yang who clicked her tongue in annoyance.

"We understand. Thank you Ms. Nikos."

"Please, call me Pyrrha," Pyrrha said, as she raised her left hand in slight protest at the formality.

"Only if you call me Ruby," she chirruped back.

Pyrrha grinned that same overly gentle and kind practiced smile and bowed her head. "That sounds grand. But I'm sorry to say, I must return to the cockpit."

The door hissed closed, leaving the four of them to themselves.

"Well… that went better than I was expecting." Yang admitted cheerily as she threw an arm around her sister. "Guess we had nothing to worry about."

"Yeah…" Ruby wasn't so sure. "Nothing to worry about."

* * *

Pyrrha locked the door to her room behind her as she leaned against it and let out a pained breath. Her hand, the one she had shaken with Ruby, felt as though the bones had been turned to splinters, the muscles torn and the skin peeled in long strips.

What Pyrrha had done was stupid:. but she wanted to be sure.

Wanted to be certain.

She lifted her hand to the dull light of her quarters and though she was prepared for what she might see, her breath still caught in her throat as Pyrrha choked down a moment of panic.

The skin of her hand was blacker than the void and dead.

Her fingers wouldn't move; she could barely twist her wrist. Already the rot was setting in, eating away at the healthy olive-coloured flesh of her arm.

Pyrrha cursed under her breath as she slipped on her gauntlets to cover the damage that Ruby had unknowingly inflicted on her.

It had been stupid. More than stupid. Her reaction to their first meeting should have been enough, but Pyrrha was never one to do anything by half. She just needed the confirmation. While Pyrrha was sure that her hand would heal over time, another exposure like that, or the previous one in the hold could either cripple or kill her.

Pyrrha tried to close her hand and winced in pain. She would have to be careful for now.

Ruby wouldn't be a problem. Pyrrha doubted the young girl actually knew what she was. The problem would be inducting her. It would have to be done in secret: lessons given alone, secrets, knowledge, rituals revealed. The crew, her compatriots, none of them were allowed to know. They couldn't know.

She felt her heart drop and blinked away a tear

Jaune couldn't know. That was always the hardest part.

Pyrrha glanced around her barren chambers. They were dull and lifeless, the walls a pale grey and there was nothing to mark that someone did live here, save for the sword and rifle hanging from their place on the wall.

She took a deep breath of stale, recycled air, and not for the first time nor the last time, cursed the burden, the destiny, that she had been sworn to.

But Pyrrha Nikos, Daughter and Secret Keeper of the Ordo Sol Invictus was never one to shirk duty. To avoid purpose. This was her destiny and thus she would carry it out.

No matter how lonely it became.

* * *

_Nine days since leaving Caviis IV_

Yang yawned and stretched as she left her room. The holster at her hip felt uncomfortably empty. She missed the weight of _Ember Celica _at her side; that extra feeling of security her boarding pistol brought her.

But rules were rules.

Yang was sure she could take any of the _Juniper _crew on. However, getting into a fight on the ship was not conducive to her job of being a bodyguard for the Heir Apparent. Void be damned if Yang was going to give little Weiss-cream any reason to deduct from her reward.

Still, space travel made her anxious and just this side of ill-tempered. She hated it. The waiting. The feeling of being stuck in an inescapable tin can for hours, days, weeks at a time. Water strictly rationed to two twenty-second showers a day and food being little more than hardtack smeared with some grey and lumpy protein paste.

_Well...at least it's better than reycke._

Thankfully the _Juniper_ crew seemed more than willing to include them in their daily, time-burning activities.

Nora and Ruby would often wander off to some small part of the ship, no doubt rapid-firing asking and answering questions with each other at speeds only those two could seem to keep up with. Blake busied herself with a data slate filled with literally thousands of books ranging from literary fiction and pulpy fantasy to the classics of philosophy and history (as well as a shockingly large amount of erotic literature and images.)

Weiss kept to herself when Ruby was helping and Ruby seemed to have grown rather fond of each other, and they would spend hours talking or playing data slate board games like Regicide or Mistrialian _Go_ when Nora was busy with some other task. Sometimes, Weiss would stick close to Yang, but she knew that she was a little too crass for Weisscicle. Not that the two didn't have some good talks now and then, but Weiss tended to lose interest once Yang got to the "then I punched him in the face" part of her stories.

All of them agreed that keeping Weiss's identity a secret was for the best; the crew of the _Juniper_ seemed to be a trustworthy and honest group, but there was no telling what they would do if they found out there was an Atlassian Noble on board. Much less the Heir Apparent. The thought of an easily extracted ransom might be too much for the _Juniper _crew.

The door to the common room-slash-mess opened and Yang found herself looking into a rather strange sight...

Around the polished plastisteel table sat Nora, Ruby, Weiss, Ren and Captain Arc. The former of the five were deep in a game of _Spacer's Run, an_ incredibly intricate and complicated card game revolving around buying, selling, trading cards to make hand over several rounds, while Arc… knitted?

Yang blinked. Then blinked again.

Yes, there was Arc, sitting there happily knitting, as he offered advice and pointers to both Weiss and Ruby as they were fairly new players.

"Not something I thought I would see," Yang announced after a moment or two of pause. "You… uh, you knit a lot, Cap'n Arc?"

"There is a lot of dead time to fill in the void," Jaune shrugged and said, "Need to do something to keep the mind from wandering too much."

Yang opened her mouth, then closed it. It was sound advice, though Yang personally preferred old fashioned fisticuffs to sitting around and playing a card game or two. Or knitting for that manner.

Jaune marked off his knitting, setting it aside as Ren dealt another hand. While Nora weaved another story about one of the _Juniper_'s more eventful adventures.

"So we had picked up this cargo right? About a thousand or so crates."

"More like a hundred," Ren corrected calmly as he tossed in his last few bars of Aegisalt.

"And we were told under no circumstances were we ever to look into them under pain of horrific execution."

"We were told just not to look into them."

"So Cap'n does what he's told and we're making the run… and BOOM!" Nora threw her hands wide. "We run into over a dozen Protectorate heavy cruisers and a battlecruiser!"

"It was a single light-cruiser and two frigates actually," Ren, again corrected as he bought a card after checking his hand.

Yang smirked as Weiss seemed to scowl and Ruby leaned in closer at every word.

"So the Cap'n pulls our girl into a hard bank and though the _Juniper_ is fast, we're outgunned, we're dodging shots and missiles and torpedoes… when the Cap'n gets this idea. He runs us into an asteroid field, shuts down all power, runs us cold, then sends a little message to the Blood Pact Raiders. This was a gang who had some serious beef with us and Jaune tells them…"

Nora dropped her voice an octave. "Hey Blood Pact! You stink like some dirt sucking slag faces… Come get us we're here."

"I don't sound like that," Jaune commented idly, the corners of his mouth ticking up.

"And so the Blood Pact shows up," Nora continued to ignore the peanut gallery, "and runs into Procs! So while the Blood Pact is getting slaughtered by the Procs, we managed to slip through around to escape and finish the run!"

"Best part of that run? Guess what was in the boxes?" Jaune teased as he set his knitting aside.

"Weapons? Medicine? Drugs? Cash?" Yang listed off a number of things the pirates tended to smuggle.

Jaune grinned. "Cheese."

The table fell to laughing. Even stuck up Weiss-cream cracked a smile.

It was strange to see Ruby snort and laugh with the rest of the crew, causing the rest to laugh even louder along with her. It made Yang smile all the more to see how quickly the _Juniper'_s crew had accepted Ruby. Sadly there was, of course, the period right after take off when Jaune and Ren had avoided Ruby like a plague, and the mysterious Pyrrha woman was only rarely seen.

But much to Yang's surprise, Jaune and Ren had slowly warmed up to Ruby. Whether it was because Weiss was a constant companion, Ruby's own seemingly infinite cheerfulness, or because they were all stuck in this tin-can and were pushing day nine, Yang wasn't entirely sure why. But she was thankful that the others had come to accept Ruby.

"Well…" Jaune yawned as he stood up and stretched, "I should go relieve Pyrrha. We're going to be dropping out of the Fold soon. Should just be one la..."

He was cut off as alarms shrieked and the ship shuddered into real space. All of them were thrown to the ground, heads cracking on the deck plating and furniture.

"Jaune." Pyrrha's voice came over the intercom, her tone utterly calm and collected. That woman seemed to be unflappable. "We have Grimm."

"Shit." Jaune spat sd he leapt to his feet and raced to the cockpit.

Ren helped Weiss to her feet, while Nora pushed Ruby and Yang back towards their rooms. Yang had to admit she was taken aback by Nora's sheer brawn as she was shoved out into the hall.

_Going to have to have an arm-wrestling match with her once this Grimm business is done. _Yang licked the top of her lip as she allowed herself to be physically removed by the engineer.

"What can we do?" Ruby called, as she rushed to join the two.

"Get into your rooms and bar the doors," Ren ordered calmly as he moved down the hall to the armoury.

"Fuck that." Yang grinned savagely. Her blood was up. "Give me a gun. I haven't shot something in a long time."

"Yeah!" Ruby cheered, "We can help!"

"We're not helpless, you know," Weiss pointedly added as she followed them down the hallway.

"I have no doubt that you aren't helpless, but you are our passengers. We must ensure your safety," Ren answered patiently, his eyes half-lidded as though the impending danger of a Grimm boarding action was still a rather trivial concern

"You're going to need more than just yourself and Nora," Yang countered as she shook off Nora's guiding hand, "You can use us."

Ren was about to reply when Jaune came over the intercom.

"Ren, lock everything down… I don't know where they came from but there's a whole flock of Griffins and at least two Nevermore Grandis. They must have been what pulled us from the Fold. Pyrrha's coming down to help with defenses."

Ren let out an irritated breath. "Fine. But you listen to Pyrrha, Nora and myself, understood?"

Yang smashed her fists together, "You got it chief."

Yang howled as her pistol roared. Three shots hit centre mass on the Griffon who had just phased through the armour plating of the ship. Its inky flesh exploded out in a mess of black viscera, as it howled in pain spreading its wings and rearing up on its back legs. Its white bone mask and four crimson eyes, filled with a primordial hatred and hunger, stared hungrily back at her.

The Grimm screeched and leapt at her, beak wide open to rip and tear into her flesh. Yang ducked and brought the pistol underneath its head and fired. The Grimm's head detonated as the heavy calibre round tore into what should have been its brainpan and exploded, showering the area with bits of bone and midnight purple blood.

Blood the colour of shadows.

Beside her, Nora grunted as she caught a claw with her shotgun. With her own roar, she twisted it down and threw it off balance, firing two rounds into its bone mask, shattering it like glass. She left it bleeding on the floor, heavily injured and dying.

Nora yelled triumphantly as she then slammed the butt of her gun into the head of the Griffon, putting it out of its misery with a sickening crack.

Behind them, another was gunned down by concentrated fire from Weiss and Ren. Even as they brought three Griffons down, another four phased into the ship, screeching their hunger for the crew.

Yang shuddered at the inhuman, evil sound. She squeezed the trigger rapidly, firing several more explosive shots into the leader, who fell to the floor with massive chunks of its body splattering against the hall. She had fired until her pistol ran dry.

"Void take it all." Yang spat, as she pistol-whipped one more, caving its skull in with the grip of _Ember Celica_. "How many of these things are there?"

A shadow danced around her as Blake rammed her heavy boarding blade into its sagging mouth and then down its flank, parting shadow flesh and leaving the creature to wither and die. Blake danced away, a small smirk of satisfaction as she ducked under another swipe. Coming back up, Blake brought _Gambol_ _Shroud _down onto the neck of another Griffon, before leaping back elegantly as Nora and Yang advanced unleashing a cascade of shots into its still twitching form.

The ship shook; Yang felt the familiar thrum of the magnetic charge in the back of her teeth as the _Juniper_ lashed out in anger. Her eyes widened; the charge was akin to ones that powered the guns they mounted on the _Muninn_. A ship almost four times the size of the _Juniper._

_Guess they weren't lying about that._ Yang thought savagely. She wasn't sure what Captain Arc was aiming at, but as she slamed a new magazine home, she sure as hell hoped he hit the fucking thing.

"Hold them off a little longer!" Jaune's panicked voice shouted over the coms. "One of the Nevermores is dead, but we got three more...Damnit."

The link cut out.

Yang scoffed and fired as more Griffons poured through the ship's hull, filling the _Juniper _with a screeching mass of shadowy flesh, white bone masks, and hateful, hungry eyes.

"Easy for him to say. Come on you ugly pieces of shit!" Yang roared in challenge quickly reloading before she rushed into the middle of them, firing wildly and striking out with heavy, hammering blows that left the inhuman malice of the Grimm staggering.

They just had to hold on a little longer.

* * *

Ruby wasn't exactly sure how she got here. She originally had planned to be with Weiss and Yang guarding the engines and the point defense weapon bay. Instead, she had been roped into holding the hall to the cockpit with Pyrrha as Griffons phased into existence in front of them.

She aimed for their eyes and mouth. _Crescent Rose _barked in a steady staccato as she fired a short burst of fire down the hall, expertly hitting her targets. Beside her, Pyrrha twirled her sword in an easy flourish in her left hand. Her right was encased in a bronze-coloured gauntlet as she softly chanted an oddly soothing and peaceful song that Ruby did not know the origins of.

Every now and then, a screeching Griffon would get to close, and Pyrrha would react with inhuman speed and deadly grace. She cut each Grimm down with the spectacular ease of the dancers she had once glimpsed on a holovid. But in person, in fighting, Ruby had never seen anything like it.

Usually, a Grimm, even small ones like Griffons, were tough bastards to put down, often needing half a magazine to put down. Pyrrha, it seemed, just sliced through them.

A perfect strike.

A breathtaking cut.

And the monsters instantly went down, night-red blood glistening on the deck.

Every now and then Ruby thought she saw a brief flash of golden light, but dismissed it. She tensed, getting ready to aim at the next Griffon that phased in. It was probably just the muzzle flash of her rifle.

It seemed like hours the two held the hall that line to the cockpit. They gunned and cut down every demon that came.

"How… How many more?" Ruby panted, as she slid another magazine into her rifle. "I'm running really low on ammo."

"It does not matter," Pyrrha's voice did not waver, she seemed not even to be tired, "We must hold them. If they get to Jaune, then we all die."

"Cheery thought," Ruby quipped back as fired another burst down the hall, catching a Griffon who had just phased into existence full in the face with a three round burst.

The air buzzed with electrical discharge. Ruby felt her stomach plummet and the back of her teeth vibrate as the _Juniper_ rocked with the discharge of her primary gun.

"Last Nevermore down!" Jaune crackled to life over the coms, his voice filled with excitement "I'm getting ready to Fold. On my mark in three… two… one… Mark!"

Beneath her feet, Ruby could feel the thrum of energy as the _Juniper _launched forward into the Fold. They escaped the main horde of Grimm. Ruby could hear the sounds of fighting lighting up in the distance from the few Grimm still remaining as her friends cleared the ship. She closed her eyes and wiped the sweat off her forehead with a grin.

Suddenly, a Griffon charged her, barreling down the hall. Her eyes popped open as it screeched in rage and seethed hatred.

Pyrrha moved to intercept …

And missed.

Ruby's eyes widened and her grip briefly slipped her rifle as she watched the red-haired woman being battered aside, crashing against the wall and falling to the floor in a heap.

Ruby raised her rifle steadying her shaking hands. Even if she hit, the Griffon could take the shots and still tear her to pieces.

She fired and closed her eyes, ready to feel her flesh being ripped from her bones by its needle-sharp teeth.

Her heart pounded. Seconds ticked by… and there was nothing.

No claws, no tearing, no biting. No pain as her life was ripped from her body by a monster.

Even the screeching had stopped, save for the one or two in the aft that were quickly put down by Yang and the others.

Ruby slowly opened her eyes… The Griffon was dead. The beast was dead. Its jaw loose, its beak hung open. Its tongue shrivelled and its eyes, once lit brightly with malice and hunger, were dull and empty, as though the anger had simply melted away. Its torn, shredded wings lay out stretched and its clawed for legs crumpled underneath it.

It had died not even two feet in front of her. With no wound to speak of.

She looked up and right into the knowing emerald gaze of Pyrrha Nikos.

* * *

**A/N:** So things getting a little interesting, why is Pyrrha interested in Ruby? What will happen when they get to their destination?


	7. Dark Signs

**Chapter Seven:** _Dark Signs_

Shredded Lho leaf spilled over the console as Jaune's trembling fingers struggled to roll the flimsy paper. He took a deep breath and brought the smoke to his lips.

He took a deep drag and slowly breathed out the acid burn as his hands slowly stilled; his heart rate slowly turned back to normal. The cockpit of the _Juniper_ was soon filled with the harsh scent of burning Lho as he closed his eyes for a moment to enjoy its taste.

Jaune could still hear the sporadic fire down the hall as his crew and his well-armed passengers went through and rid the ship of the few Grimm that had managed to get on board before the Fold. He leaned back in his chair taking another long drag and flicking the ash into a small ashtray that Nora had welded into his seat.

Jaune chuckled at the teal eyed frowny face that glared up at him from the bottom of the ashtray and made a silent thank you to Nora. He hoped she was alright, but so far no one had reported any injuries. Still, he wished someone could come to relieve him. He wanted to go see his crew, he wanted to make sure for himself that they were okay.

His hands began to shake again and he willed himself to take deep, long, calming drags. Suddenly the door opened with a hiss, Jaune turned, tense and readied, but relaxed as Ren and Ms. Snow walked in calmly, her nose wrinkling comically as the smell of burning Lho and paper wafted from Jaune's lit lhostick.

Ren was more subtle in his disapproval. His lips slightly twitched and his brow barely creased while he waved his hand to clear the smoke. Jaune shrugged, a small apologetic smile gracing his face, before stubbing out the lhostick in the tray.

"Ship's clear Jaune," Ren reported quietly.

"Anyone injured?" Jaune asked, his fingers unconsciously clenching and releasing the armrests of his chair.

Ren shook his head. "Some light bruising. Nothing serious."

Jaune breathed a long sigh of relief, as he turned to Ms. Snow who stood straight and proud. He caught sight of her rapier and pistol at her hip and frowned slightly before catching himself and stood up out of his chair, giving her a slight bow.

"Ms. Snow. I'm sorry for the Grimm. I hope that you and your friends are alright?"

"My… escorts and I assisted Master Ren and crew in repelling the Grimm," Ms. Snow sniffed, accepting his bow with a slight nod of her head. "I wanted to give you my compliments on having such an effective and well-trained crew considering the crisis. Your conduct exceeded my expectations for a crew outside of civilized space."

It was a compliment, albeit a backhanded one.

"Uh… Thanks?" Jaune's fingers tightened again as he shared a look with Ren, who merely shrugged, his way of saying: _let it go._

The pale and cold woman smiled briefly, a bit of warmth chasing away the pale frost of an early spring. "I am glad that Ms. Xiao Long hired you, Captain Arc. Now, gentlemen, if you will excuse me."

She left without waiting for their reply.

Jaune sighed and sank back into his chair. He cupped his hands to his face before looking up at his first mate. "Where's Pyrrha and Nora? Were they with you?"

Ren took his customary seat beside his captain and shook his head. "Nora was with me and the passengers at the engine core. Pyrrha was guarding the hall to the cockpit with Ms. Rose. As for where they are? Pyrrha, I don't know… Nora..."

Ren smiled as he counted down on his fingers, three, two, one…

The door hissed opened as Nora bounded inside. "Well wasn't that exciting!? There were tonnes, TONNES of Grimm and Ren was gunning them down like, pew pew pew and I was cracking their skulls, while Cap'n… Cap'n you flew amazingly I'm sure. Not that I could see of course, 'cause I was too busy trying to keep the Grimm from damaging the _Juniper_'s engines and from eating Ren; noththatheneededmyhelp, but I'm sure you were flying her really well!"

She flopped into her chair behind Ren and wrapped her arms around his shoulders. Jaune had to suppress a smile as Nora hugged him tightly and caused a gasping wheeze to escape Ren's light, thin frame.

"So I think a fight like that deserves pancakes. We should make pancakes and by we, I mean you, Renny. You make the best damn pancakes out of everyone. Even the Cap'n can't match up to yours, Ren! OOOOOH! If we're doing that, Cap'n Jaune should pull out that bacon we've been saving! Pancakes and bacon!"

"That does sound grand," Pyrrha agreed tiredly opening the door for the fourth time.

She was still dressed in her armour. The bronze corset was stained dark purple with Grimm shadow blood and Jaune noticed, worryingly, that there was a dent where she had been obviously struck by a massive blow. Other than favouring her right hand, which she kept close to her chest, she seemed to be perfectly fine.

Pyrrha looked up, bright emerald meeting his worried frown. She shook her head gently, a smile stretching her lips and her eyes sparkled in the dimly light cabin. Jaune held her stare for a second, then nodded letting his unasked questions drop.

"Oh yeah!" Nora cheered as she leapt from her seat, punching the air. "This! Is! Happening!"

"I could use some real food and pancakes sound lovely." Pyrrha agreed with a fond smile as she pulled her xiphos and began wiping off the thick ichor of Grimm blood.

"I guess I'm not being given much of a choice…" Ren sighed, over dramatically.

The four friends chuckled as the tension of the last several minutes slowly eased away.

"Ms. Snow and her friends certainly earned their place to be a part of this," Nora chirped up excitedly, "'Specially that Yang! She charged a Griffon all by herself! Bowled it over down the hall!"

Ren tilted his head slightly in agreement as he eased back in his chair. "Belladonna impressed me as well. She moves quickly, and Ms. Snow was… precise with her shots and no movement wasted in her fencing."

"Ruby fights very well for one so young," Pyrrha commented as she examined her blade, searching for nicks and notches in the metal. "Could use some more discipline, but I must admit she has a lot of potential."

High praise indeed from Pyrrha.

Jaune was silent for a moment, his fingers gripping the arm of his chair. "I… I'm happy they're here. If they weren't… We'd probably be dead. I've never seen a horde of Grimm that big before."

"Well, we are near Grimm Space." Ren reasoned, "We shouldn't be surprised by a horde that big."

Jaune shook his head. "If they were coming _from_ Grimm Space I would agree with you."

He leaned over the console and pressed a few buttons. A second later, the cabin was lit up by the dark glowing green of a hologram. "This is the reading the _Juniper_ got just after we were pulled from the Fold by the Nevermore Grandis."

A click and the hologram was filled with dark red blotches. The three stared at it in silence for several moments.

"They… were coming from behind us," Pyrrha observed dispassionately, burying her true thoughts beneath a cloak of cool-headedness and professionalism. "They were heading _to _Grimm Space."

"Do...do you think this has something to do with Ms. Snow, Ruby and them, Cap'n?" Nora asked, looking over to him, while Jaune noticed her hands went instantly to Ren's shoulders.

"I don't know," Jaune answered, biting his lower lip. "But I do know we're being lied to and probably in over our heads."

"Ms. Snow is not an academic. That much I know for sure," Ren agreed with a nod. "She's too proper. Too stiff. The way she looks at us… she's a Proc noble. Military through and through."

"From what you have told me, everything in the Protectorate revolves around the military," Pyrrha added thoughtfully as she slid her xiphos back into its sheath. "It could be a holdover from that."

"I thought that too," Jaune agreed, "Until now, when I finally got a good look at her pistol."

"What's that got to do with anything?" Nora asked, "She has a fancy pea-shooter. Every Proc noble has a fancy pea-shooter. I mean have you seen how loaded some of them are? I wish I was a Proc nobless! Pancakes every night and I could really turn _Magnhild_ into a right monster. BOOM!"

"That 'pea-shooter' is an _Arma Gigas._" Jaune corrected but received only blank stares from his three crew. "Right. Sorry, an _Arma Gigas _is a pistol given only to the Lord Protector and their closet allies and confidants. She most likely works for the House of Schnee."

"How do you know that?" Nora asked loudly, then paused and smacked herself in the head. "Riiiiight I forgot that you're a big fancy noble in Vale. You've been floating around with us space trash I completely forgot about that."

"Why though?" Pyrrha asked, cool and unflappable as always. "Why hire us? They have hundreds of ships. Why not just use one of theirs?"

"The better question is why is she travelling with two Faunus? From what I have heard the Faunus are not overly fond of the Schnees," Ren interjected, a rare frown forming as he steepled his fingers in front of his face.

"Only one is a Faunus," Pyrrha corrected with a shake of her head. "Yang is unnatural. If I had to guess I would say gene-tampering."

Both Ren and Jaune nodded. They had both come to trust Pyrrha's instincts and gut feelings over the years they had been together.

"Still…" Pyrrha continued. "Ren is right. Why is she travelling with a Faunus?"

"Or even someone who is gene-tailored. Procs tend to look down on it, they see it as something given, not, earned," Jaune added.

So many questions were being raised and none that Jaune had an answer to. He bit his lip. To be completely honest, he didn't entirely want an answer. If the House of Schnee was involved, then this could be big. And big things could lead to big cash rewards if one could play their cards right. At the same time, if the House of Schnee was involved, then this job had become that much more dangerous.

He was starting to regret not asking for more.

_Should have asked for at least triple._

"I don't know," Jaune admitted as he leaned back in his chair frowning. "I don't know and I think it's best that we don't know. Keeping our heads down, not asking questions is probably the best thing we can do right now. The less we know the better. We keep quiet, we do what we were hired to do, then maybe, when we finish the contract, we can work out a better deal than the one we got right now."

The other three nodded their agreement. The issue was settled for now and more pressing things could be addressed.

Like pancakes.

* * *

Ruby awoke to strange, but wonderful, mouth-watering smells and sounds. The waft of bacon sizzling merely in a pan, the smell of hot and fresh pancakes cooking on a griddle.

Real food.

She barely stopped to dress before she rushed out of her and Weiss's shared quarters towards where the heavenly smells were coming from. Her bare feet slapped against the cold metal floor of the armoured deck as she headed to the common area.

Most of the crew and passengers were already there. Weiss, Belladonna, and Yang were listening to Pyrrha tell a story while they nurtured steaming cups of recafe. Every once in a while, they made small pleasant murmurs as they sipped freshly brewed caffeinated drinks. Nora hovered close to Ren, practically drooling as he flipped a perfect golden brown circle on the portable griddle. Beside them, Jaune watched the bacon as it sizzled in its pan, carefully flipping the pieces over to prevent them from burning at the edge.

Ruby smiled, the scene was domestic. She would miss the crew of the _Juniper_ when everything was over. None of them were what she had expected when Yang had first told them they were hiring a smuggler's vessel and despite the extremely rocky first meeting; they had become rather close.

Or so Ruby had thought. She frowned as she looked more closely at the crews' faces. Every now and then she would catch a sideways glance from Ren as he expertly worked the griddle, as though keeping a close eye on her three friends. Jaune's cheery smile as he flipped the bacon seemed like it was almost forced, and there was a general feeling of simmering tension permeating the common room just below the surface.

"Hey, Rubes!" Yang greeted cheerfully as she scouted over to make room at the table. "Just in time sleepy-head! Cap'n Arc decided that since we ain't dead after that Grimm attack, we're getting real food."

Pyrrha's green eyes slid over to her, and Ruby felt herself almost squirming under that gaze and the mysterious woman's welcoming wasn't because she didn't like Pyrrha. Pyrrha was amazing: How she fought, how she carried herself, that warmth that seemed to flow from her. There wasn't a reason to dislike Pyrrha.

But Ruby was scared of Pyrrha. Pyrrha knew things about her, things that Ruby wasn't exactly sure she wanted to know.

"Unfortunately, we only have enough for two pancakes and two pieces of bacon each," Jaune reported sadly, not feeling the slight tension that radiated from Ruby, as he pulled the bacon from the pan and onto plasteel plates, where they were soon joined by their golden brown compatriots.

"Don't care. Real food!" Yang called back, eying each plate as they were passed out and the small bottle of maple syrup that acted as the centerpiece.

"So Ruby, how many Grimm did you bag? Bet you were nowhere near my count." Yang bragged as she chomped down on her slice of bacon, savouring the salty pork.

"I was awesome," Ruby shot back with her own challenging grin, "I was kicking butt!"

"Indeed you were," Pyrrha agreed, "she even saved my life. Didn't you, Ruby?"

The _Juniper_ side of the table stopped, all with looks of varying degrees of disbelief. Ruby found herself shrinking in embarrassment as they turned to look at her.

"I was batted away by one of the Griffons. If Ruby hadn't been there, I would be dead." Pyrrha was nonchalant as she finished off her meal, casually waving away Ruby's whispered 'it was nothing.'

"I owe you my life," Pyrrha continued, "so thank you."

"You're welcome…" Ruby mumbled as she stared at her plate, her ears burning. She wasn't used to praise being heaped on her and she could feel her face also turning red with embarrassment. But she couldn't help the small, pleased grin tugging at her lips from spreading.

"Way to go sis!" Yang cheered, "Good to see the Academy wasn't a complete waste."

"Har har," Ruby said as she looked up and stuck her tongue out at her older sister, who merely laughed.

"Were you raised in a barn?" Weiss scolded the two.

"Pirate," Yang reminded her.

"Spacer," Ruby chimed in as the two fell to fits of giggles.

Ruby laughed all the harder when she saw Weiss roll her eyes almost fondly as Belladonna grinned with them.

Soon the crew of the _Juniper _joined in and it seemed like Jaune's own smile and laughter no longer seemed so practiced or forced. Ren's eyes no longer flicked over the passengers and the odd tension coming off the crew was slowly bleeding away.

Unlike most of the other meals on the _Juniper_ where the flavourless hardtack and lumpy protein and nutrient paste were scarfed down quickly to avoid both texture and taste, the pancakes and the bacon were stretched for as long as each individual could in order to savour their first taste of real food in ten long days.

As Ruby stood up to leave, she was stopped by Pyrrha laying a gentle, but firm hand on her shoulder. Pyrrha nodded for Ruby to follow her and then stepped out of the common room. Despite being unnerved by what Pyrrha represented, Ruby was curious, and after several minutes of indecision and second-guessing; Ruby stood up and followed after the crimson-haired woman.

She found Pyrrha standing outside of her room, arms crossed and leaning against the door. She raised a hand, stopping Ruby and looked directly into her eyes. Gone was Pyrrha's polite, open friendliness. In its place was a frigid chill and a not-so-passive threat of violence.

"What I have to tell you, cannot leave outside this door. Swear to me on your very life that you will not breathe a word of this to anyone."

Ruby licked her lip and swallowed. "I swear."

Pyrrha shook her head and held out a knife. "In blood."

Ruby hesitated, then slowly reached for the knife. Its craftsmanship was astounding. It was perfectly balanced and razor-sharp, with symbols inlaid in gold running up its hilt and a circumpunct stamped into the base of the blade

She held out her palm and with a quick slash parted the meat and muscle. Dark crimson blood pooled in Ruby's palm as she held it out. Small splashes dripping onto the cold metal deck.

"I swear," Ruby whispered, wincing at the pain running up her arm.

Pyrrha nodded curtly and ushered into her room, locking the door behind them.

Unlike the rest of the ship, which felt lived in and homey, one that was crowded with Ren's charms and trinkets, Nora's paintings and even Jaune's knitting, Pyrrha's quarters were barren and cell-like. Outside of a small desk, a chair, and her cot, which was bolted into one of the walls, tbere was nothing beyond the bare metal plating.

Pyrrha glanced at her hand. "Come here. Let me bandage that for you."

Ruby winced as she held out her still bleeding hand, which Pyrrha took in a gauntleted hand. Carefully, she wrapped a clean, white cloth around the oozing cut pulling tight.

"Take a seat. We have a lot to talk about." Pyrrha gestured to the chair as she took her own on the cot, still watching Ruby with a piercing gaze. "But you have to realize… I am still bound by oaths, there are some things… many things I cannot tell you."

"I thought you were going to explain everything?" Ruby complained with a frown as she took her seat across from the other woman. "That's not really fair."

Pyrrha shook her head, her voice as stern as steel. "There is such a thing as knowing too much. Of learning too much. I will explain some things, enough things I think. Enough for you to have an understanding. But not everything, simply because explaining everything is never a good idea."

Pyhrra's voice carried such finality that Ruby knew arguing would be futile. She took a breath and held it for a second before allowing it to ease out of her lungs.

"Is this what's stopping you and Jaune?" Ruby asked after a long moment, looking up at the taller woman.

To her slight amusement, Pyrrha went bright red as she struggled to mask it.

"I… I…" Pyrrha stammered for several seconds before she took a breath and schooled her features into a hard mask of indifference. "What I may or may not feel for Jaune has little bearing in this. I have a duty, I have oaths and I have secrets that I must keep from him. No matter what I may want."

"But you could!" Ruby protested as she tried to suppress a smug snicker at the normally unflappable woman. "You two make a great couple and I'm sure he has…"

"Ruby," Pyrrha cut her off sternly. "I have oaths. I have secrets that I keep from him for as much as his own safety as I do to fulfill my own duty. What you're suggesting simply can't happen."

Ruby wanted to argue but realised it was rather futile. Pyrrha's mind was set.

"Okay. So what can you teach me?" Ruby asked after several long moments of silence.

Pyrrha's stern face slowly faded to one of apologetics as her left hand began to cradle her right, playing with the edge of her gauntlet. Several seconds passed in silence as Pyrrha opened her mouth, only to close it once again.

"I'm sorry Ruby," she apologised, "I'm not… I'm not used to this. If you had been… Well, let's just say it would have been an elder speaking to you, not me, if circumstances..."

"An elder?" Ruby asked as she leaned in, hoping for some tidbit from this woman's past, but Pyrrha shook her head.

"Tell me. What do you know about Souls?" Pyrrha finally asked, unbuckling her gauntlet.

"Uhhh… I don't really know?" Ruby was confused, what did this have to do with anything. "I've never really thought about it. I guess… that some believe that we all have one? That's it's a part of us?"

Pyrrha nodded. "Common themes and, to a point, mostly correct." Then she leaned closer, almost conspiratorial. "What do you know of the Grimm?"

"Uhh… about as much as everyone else I guess?" Ruby said with an absent-minded shrug, "They're monsters. They come from beyond Wild Space and they kill everything. What does that have to do with souls?"

Pyrrha sagged a little and smiled sadly. "Everything. You see, Ruby, the human soul is made of two parts. Creation, which fuels our joy, hope, love, serenity, inspiration and awe. The other is Destruction: our hate, anger, fear, lust and sorrow. These make us human and when we die, our souls are split in two. Creation returns to the beginning of Creation itself to build upon has been laid."

Her smile slowly withered away and she leaned back. "Destruction is cast off, where it festers and rots. Where it hungers. Eventually it will take form as a being of hatred, rage, sorrow, despair and hunger. Once it has form it will set itself loose on the galaxy as a creature of Grimm, seeking to gorge itself on our emotions, our hatreds, fears, anger and loss. That is what the creatures of Grimm are, Ruby. They are us."

Ruby raised an eyebrow, not sure if she believed what she was being told. She of course had heard a thousand different theories on the Grimm. Ranging from the purely scientific to the semi-religious. What Pyrrha was spouting seemed to be entirely theological in nature… but then again considering the nature of the Grimm... the theological sometimes made as much sense as the scientific.

"So what does that have to do with me?" Ruby asked, trying to keep the skepticism from her voice.

Pyrrha took a breath and slowly slipped her gauntlet off her right hand. "Because, Ruby Rose You have silver eyes. You do not have a soul."

Ruby's eyes widened at the sight of her hand. The flesh was a pale green and flaking away. Yellow bone could be seen in small patches where her skin had completely died and rotted away. Her hand looked as though its life had been drained away.

"Wh...Wha...What did that?" Ruby trembled, a memory of them shaking hands that first day shot into her mind. "That was… that was me, wasn't it?"

Pyrrha nodded sadly as she slipped her gauntlet back on. "I had a suspicion, but I needed to be sure."

"I… I'm a monster," Ruby whispered, still staring at Pyrrha's now covered hand.

"No." Pyrrha was firm. "Far from it. If anything, you are the greatest weapon we have against the Grimm."

"What do you mean?"

"Because you have no soul, you project an aura of sorts. That aura seeks out souls and feasts on them."

"Not doing a good job convincing me that I'm not a monster," Ruby chuckled sadly before her widened in realization, "Is that why people tend to keep away from me? Or look at me like I'm sort of filth?"

"Yes. What they feel is you feeding on their souls." Pyrrha held up a finger before Ruby could interrupt. "Not enough to do them harm but enough to make them wary of you. They won't know why and that dislike and distrust may manifest in different ways. For some it may present itself as an ill feeling, or a suspicion. For someone like… me, who has a very active soul, who has been directly touched by the gift of Creation, you can be deadly. But eventually your aura will learn who is friend and who is foe."

"How are you not in pain then? And how does that affect the Grimm?" Ruby asked cautiously. Her fingers tightening around the hem of her combat skirt.

"For two reasons, the first is because I still have the gift of Destruction in my soul." Pyrrha explained, "Your aura eventually will recognize me as human. The second is because I know how to harden my soul to your aura. Now this doesn't stop you from being painful to me. I can feel it peeling little pieces from me even now, but it is something I can manage."

"Then you should get away from me!" Ruby cried, trying to scoot the chair back, hoping the few feet between them would lessen the hurt she was causing.

"Ruby, pain is an old friend of mine." Pyrrha smile dripped bitterness that she quickly tried to hide. "The real danger comes in skin to skin contact. Creating a direct connection to us… well you've seen my hand. Though it has started to heal, but will take much more time.

"Besides you are too important for me to leave. For you see when you get close to a Grimm, your aura will begin to feed off that Grimm's pure destruction and negativity. As you remain near it you will drain it of its strength and form." Pyrrha explained gently reaching out to place a gauntleted hand on her shoulder. "If it stays in your aura long enough, it will die. And unlike when a regular person slays a Grimm, where its soul will just return to Grimm Space and eventually become a Grimm again, you will have completely destroyed it. Mind, body and soul."

Pyrrha stood up and picked up Ruby's hand. "You are far from a monster, Ruby. You are our shield against the monsters who seek to overrun and devour humanity."

* * *

The planet that Belladonna had led them to was about what Weiss had expected:A world barely clinging to life, in a dead system.

A supernova had swallowed its inner planets millennia ago, leaving only three gas giants to circle the dying star. Their target was the largest moon circling around the first gas giant.

The preliminary scans read normal , stagnant algae seas produced enough oxygen to support life and the tectonics were surprisingly stable for a moon that was tidal locked to the planet. The only issue was low level radiation that prevented the _Juniper _from gathering anything more detailed than that basic scratch information.

"I can put her down here," Captain Arc indicated a low spot down near the edge of one of the seas on the hologram. "We can take on water there while you and your friends do your Grimm hunt, Ms. Snow. Pyrrha can go with you if you want the extra hand."

"No, thank you Captain." She studied the map intently and frowned. Where Arc wanted to land was nowhere near where Belladonna had reported the White Fang encampment.

"Captain, that area is… Ill suited for my study. Perhaps more to the north. She gestured to an area by an inland sea. "You can still collect your water while we look for suitable specimens to gather data from."

The man shrugged and readjusted their bearing. "Whatever you say Ms. Snow. You're the one paying."

"I must admit," Weiss said begrudgingly, "Your crew and your ship have exceeded my expectations so far on this journey. I'll make sure to add a suitable reward to your pay, Captain Arc. Once we return to Protectorate Space, of course."

She turned and left before he could respond and went back to her quarters to wait for the landing. It wouldn't be long now. A single day's march from the landing zone and they would see if what Belladonna had told them was true.

"Come on Weiss-cream! Keep up!" Yang called cheekily from out ahead.

Weiss growled irritably as she stumbled over loose rocks coated with green slime. The moon was a pit of green and grey. They had taken off at first light, making good time at first, but then Yang had taken charge and now all were struggling to keep up with the gene-tailored woman, who bounded leaps ahead of them.

"Yang, you need to cut the pace a little," Belladonna gasped as she ran up the large hill, "And be quiet! The White Fang probably have patrols out."

Yang merely chuckled as she stopped to let the three catch up. "Doubtful. There was nothing in system when we got here. They probably think they're safe being so close to Grimm Space. You'd have to be pretty crazy to try and find out what a bunch of human-hating psychopaths are doing all the way out here."

Despite herself Weiss found herself laughing quietly at the self-deprecating humour as she creased the ridge. Behind her, Ruby bounded up with no issues, her rifle slung down at her side.

"How much farther?" she asked quietly scanning the horizon.

"Not much," Yang answered as she scanned the data slate. "I suggest we climb down and look for some shelter. Camp out until night, then make our way to the White Fang encampment."

"Agreed." Weiss nodded.

"While night will help… Many Faunus tend to have very good night vision," Belladonna warned, "Don't fall into the trap of believing that since you can't see them; they can't see you."

Yang grunted, "Not a lot of cover beyond the odd rock formation around here. I'm gonna take any advantage I can get."

The four made their descent, Weiss falling back to walk to with Ruby. Ever since the pancake night, Ruby had been quiet and withdrawn. Weiss was worried, though she was loth to admit it outright, she missed Ruby's unending cheerfulness and optimism. Ruby had become a very dear friend over the past few weeks she had known the silver-eyed spacer.

"Ruby, are you okay? You've been rather quiet over the last day or so," Weiss prodded gently.

"Huh?" Ruby looked up blinking, then laughed awkwardly, rubbing the back of her neck. "Yeah sorry just been… Just been thinking about stuff. I'm okay. Really."

"You know… I may not be great at this whole friendship thing and being open. But I want to try." Weiss wrapped her arm around Ruby's shoulder. "I'm here if you need to talk."

Ruby's smile turned sad, but she nodded. "Thanks, Weiss, it's just really personal okay? It's something I have to deal with right now. I can't even talk to Yang about it just yet."

"It has to do with that, doesn't it?" Weiss looked down at Ruby's bandaged hand.

She nodded. "It does. I'm sorry Weiss, I really am, but I can't say anymore. I promised Pyr…"

Her eyes went wide with panic and her mouth snapped shut.

"Pyrrha did this?" Weiss almost cried as she pointed at Ruby's hand. "What were you two doing?"

"Weiss! Please!" Ruby pleaded, her silver eyes wide with panic as she made a shushing gesture. "I can't talk about it. I promised her. Please! Just let it go."

Weiss glared at Ruby worryingly before she finally nodded. "Okay. Okay. I'll let it go. But promise me you'll talk to me if you need to, okay?"

Ruby's shoulders sagged and she visibly relaxed. "I will Weiss. I promise I will."

Night had fallen as Jaune walked out from the _Juniper_. The air was cold and stank of salt and algae, but the stars were bright and beautiful. He lit a lhostick and took a deep breath of burning, acidic smoke.

"You're worried about them, aren't you?" Pyrrha asked from behind him.

He yelped in surprise and nearly dropped his lhostick as Pyrrha stepped out from under the ship. A small smile playing across her lips as she took the lho from his hand and took a drag.

"I'm more worried about what kind of trouble they could be getting us into," Jaune corrected. Though that wasn't entirely true. He liked them for the most part. Ruby was adorable and eager, Yang was fun and loud, Weiss dignified and intelligent, while Belladonna was quiet but contemplative.

He didn't want them as enemies, and despite his own recent advice about keeping them at arm's length, Jaune felt as though he was indebted to them. They had helped to save the _Juniper. _They had helped to save his crew, the only family he had out here in this forsaken end of space.

"Nothing that we haven't dealt with before," Pyrrha countered with a fond smile as she passed him back his lhostick. "They're good people Jaune. You did the right thing by getting us this job. You'll see."

"I'm sure. Thanks Pyrrha." He took a drag then dropped it onto the stones and ground it out. "I'm going to take a little patrol. Maybe we'll get lucky and they'll be coming back. I could use the company."

Pyrrha looked regretful as she shook her head. "I have to help Nora with the water. Be careful out there."

Jaune tried not to let his disappointment show as he picked his rifle up from where it lay on the ground. "I'll be back in an hour or so then."

Jaune cursed as he slipped on a algae-covered stone, but managed to catch himself before falling face-first into the rocky ground.

What a planet.

It was a stinking ball of green out in the middle of nowhere. But you could never be too careful, such was the first and only law of Wild Space.

Still, there wasn't anything out here. At least, nothing more than rocks and stinking algae. He was just about to turn back when he heard the familiar sound of several rifles being racked, as a half-dozen or so shadows lept from cover, weapons drawn and all of them pointed at him.

"Well, look who we got here lads." A large bear Fanuas said eagerly from behind his bone-white Grimm mask. "A filthy human on a stroll. What luck."

Jaune quickly raised his hands and let _Crocea Mors_ drop to the ground.

_Well… shit._

* * *

_Well shit!_ Blake thought bitterly as she fired off another round at the White Fang who chased after them.

They had made it to the encampment, keeping low and to the shadows, but the White Fang had not been as lax as Yang had believed they might have been. They had barely gotten within a hundred metres when the alarm had sounded, and now they were being chased by over a dozen White Fang.

Rifle fire skipped after her and Blake cursed as she felt several shots fly by, missing her by only a hare's breath. She ducked behind a large boulder, just as Rose sprang from her own cover and fired a burst that brought a Fang member down like a sack of meat.

"I got you, Belladonna! Move!" Ruby cried as she fired another burst, before ducking to cover.

Blake didn't need to be told twice, as she leapt up and ran towards where Yang and the Schnee had taken cover… Both of whom were squabbling about what to do next.

"We should stay and fight," Yang was yelling over the gunfire. "We can't lead them back to the _Juniper, _and besides, we can take em!"

"No we can't, Yang!" Weiss shot back. "We're outnumbered and outgunned. We need to get back to the _Juniper _and get help."

"Or we could help Rose get over here!" Blake snapped, firing off several rounds, causing the Fang to duck.

"Point," Yang conceded as her gun roared and spat fire.

Blake watched as Rose sped back towards them, leaping over rocks and diving behind the large rock they were using as cover to join them.

"I think we made them mad," Rose panted as she reloaded.

"You don't say," Blake snarked as she fired off several rounds at a Fang member running towards them, catching him in the face and dropping him.

"So what do we do?" Rose asked them as she laid prone with her rifle in hand, waiting for a target to appear.

"We should fight!"

"Withdraw."

Both the Schnee and Yang said at the same time, starting the argument all over again.

"I don't think this is going to help…" Rose was trying to interject.

Blake ignored them, her eyes narrowing. She was one of those Faunas who had that vision she had warned her friends about, and she could see quite clearly. The rifle fire had slacked off, and the Fang had vanished back into the night.

"Quiet." Blake hissed. Silencing the three. "Something's coming."

'Something' wasn't quite right; it was someone.

It was a woman dressed in the same style of armour as that Nikos woman, only hers was a dark red as opposed to Nikos's bright, polished bronze. The corset hugged her curves and her long, lush black hair fell in waves across her shoulders.

Most disturbing of all was the large beastly figure of a Beowulf Grimm at her side. Its muzzle open, its long, clawed hands flexing with eagerness. Its dark red eyes fixed on them. Then another pair of hate-filled eyes appeared.

Then another.

And another.

Soon dozens of hateful, crimson eyes were glowing in the dark behind the raven-haired woman.

"That… That… That's not possible," Yang whispered.

"She's controlling the Grimm." The Schnee was stunned, her pistol fell from her grasp.

Then the woman raised her hand.

* * *

**A/N:** Cinder Fall steps into the scene. Also there shall be a slight hiatus as I will be gone for the next two weeks so the next chapter will be uploaded March 6th. Hope you enjoyed this chapter and please drop a review!


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